


how to succeed in xenobiology without really trying

by nayanroo, nefelokokkygia



Series: tony stark: master of the universe [2]
Category: The Avengers (2012)
Genre: Alien Biology, Cultural Differences, F/M, For Science!, Gen, Mating Cycles/In Heat, Science Bros, Worldbuilding, Xenobiology, silly concepts made serious, tony why
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-02-10
Updated: 2016-03-02
Packaged: 2017-11-28 19:50:16
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 33,659
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/678250
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nayanroo/pseuds/nayanroo, https://archiveofourown.org/users/nefelokokkygia/pseuds/nefelokokkygia
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“Yeah really, I know you're both on some kind of weird alien pheromone reproductive high right now, but <i>babies</i>? In <i>my tower</i>?”</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> this fic is the product of countless 2 am conversations about weird alien biology, worldbuilding, and how serious even the strangest (and silliest) of concepts can be made. don't take it too seriously, for our health and yours. there will be a plot hidden inside all of the alien biology and porn somewhere.

Sif runs her tongue between her teeth, feeling their dips and curves, digging into the hard, sharpened bones.

There is an itch beneath her skin she cannot define, a prickle upon her neck she cannot describe. The warrior cannot remember it beginning, only that it crawls along her arms and flashes behind her eyes, hot in the back of her throat. It feels as if it has always been within her, buried quiet in her bones until now, clawing through her muscles and slick in the sinew of her limbs.

Sif _wants_ ; there is a hunger within her ribs, slick between her legs, burning stars beneath her fingers, but for what she does not know.

The warrior twists and turns in her battle stances, the leather grip of her glaive warm in her palm, the weapon slick with her sweat and worn from centuries of use. She feels the prickle beneath her skin fading as she moves, ebbing away like tides upon a shore, weaker and weaker as they rise against her. It is mere lust for battle she thinks, for the heaviness of armor and cloth over her shoulders and the burn of her muscles as she rips her enemies to the ground.

Sif does not wish to see the citizens of Miðgarðr in danger, but the training rooms of Avengers Tower can only do so much. She is _Æsir_ , a shieldmaiden; conflict is her blood, the thrill of the battlefield maps her ribs.

She is the Goddess of War, and War is a fickle force, untamed and destructive, Chaos in his most ordered form.

“Sif?”

(Speak of the wolf, and he will stand at the door.)

The warrior whips around, hair long slipped of its tail and falling around her face, slick with sweat against her red-run skin.

The God of Mischief stands in the doorway, long and lithe beneath leather and cloth, adorned in gold. His hair is long, layered and curved wild around his face and over his shoulders, decorated with tails and braids by his own hands. The shadow of his cheekbones catches the warrior's eye, and her gaze follows the line of his jaw, down the curve of his throat until the high collar of his longcoat hides it from her view. The God's form is thin beneath his many layers, and the desire to rip them from him with her teeth overwhelms Sif, her eyes traveling down his legs and over his chest, finally meeting his gaze.

(Her curious eyes are not lost on Loki, but he says nothing; the rush of hormones after physical exertion is not unknown to him, and if she seeks him out with more teeth in her kisses than usual later, he will find nothing strange about them.)

“Stark has prepared dinner,” the God tells her, “Will you join them?”

Sif does not miss the way Loki says _them_ and not _us_ , but she leaves it be. Loki is still not entirely comfortable with the Avengers, and they not entirely with him, but they are all trying, and if he keeps his distance then so be it.

“I suppose I have been here long enough,” the warrior replies, gathering a towel from one of the nearby benches to wipe the sweat from her glaive. “Tell them I will join them shortly, then.”

Loki nods, turning his back on her and departing as silently as he had come.

Her gaze doesn't leave his body until she can no longer see him, the itch prickling beneath her skin once more, liquid upon her tongue and slick down her throat; an idea in her mind, forming. 

(Watching him leave is second only to seeing him come her way, and she licks her lips as she unwraps the tape from her hands, desire dripping from her hound-teeth.)

 

When she finds Loki again, the God is in one of Stark's many laboratories. The protective glass walls are thick and reinforced, but Sif's hearing is sharper than any human's, and she can hear their conversation with ease.

Stark has Loki seated in a chair, the cloth and leathers of his ensemble draped over a nearby table. Electrodes and their wires are stuck to his bare chest, two strange antennae are secured to both of his ears, and Sif watches as the Tony pricks him with a needle. His blood is ruby-red and dark as it fills the chamber, and Sif licks her teeth, silent.

“You know, I was honestly expecting some Vulcan green out of you,” Stark comments, and the reference is lost on Sif, but his meaning is clear. “Can I call you Mr. Spock?”

“You may _not_ ,” the God growls, and the gravel in his voice prickles beneath Sif's fingertips, slides down her back like water. She secretly hopes the inventor prods him again, draws the low dark out of his throat even more.

“Your blood is red, you look like a human who got fed Miracle-Gro as a child, and you have the same color eyes as Captain America,” Tony rattles off, carefully arranging the samples for JARVIS to analyze. The whir and clicks of the equipment are quiet in Sif's ears, and the screens and holographic interfaces begin lighting up with data as the analysis begins.

“You're not nearly alien enough yet, you gotta cut me a break somewhere.”

Sif's ear perk up as the machines beep lowly, results flashing onto the screens as they finish, holographic models of DNA and various compounds and molecules rotating in view. 

“Did I say 'yet'? I take that back, you're definitely an alien now,” Stark says, pulling various projections of enzymes and compounds down to eye-level.

“What is _this_?” he asks, turning to Loki with a complicated-looking structure in his hand. Sif recognizes it from the brief lessons in science and biology from when she was centuries younger, its form fresh in her mind from seeing so many of Loki's books over the years.

“That is _Jötunn_ DNA, Stark,” Loki answers, raising a groomed brow in exasperation.

“It looks like a great icosahedron that got thrown into a blender and then run over by a truck.”

“All beings of Yggdrasill's hold are alike in their physical forms. Their DNA however, differs greatly,” Loki explains. “For example, you humans do not need to withstand high amounts of cosmic radiation, nor do you have the same capacity for magic or require the means to sustain it.”

“Magic is just science I haven't explained yet,” Tony muses, tossing the DNA structure over his shoulder and toying with other various substances floating around his head. Sif watches the billionaire like a child at play as he pulls apart the compounds, listening as JARVIS explains the theoretical function of each.

A few moments pass in silence until Tony whirls around, sitting on the stool in front of Loki, holding tight to what the God recognizes (too late) as a hologram of a sexual hormone.

(Unseen, Sif scratches at her neck, the faint watercolor of a bite mark staining her skin, and her smile is teeth.)

“So how do you all have sex?”

Loki's brow furrows in annoyance, a slight hiss escaping his teeth, pupils shrinking. The machine monitoring his brainwave activity begins to beep, the antennae on the God's ears blinking. Tony hops off the stool, tossing the hologram to the irritated _Jötunn_ before patting a hand to his head.

“Easy there kitty, no need to be territorial,” the billionaire chides, typing rapidly into one of the computer terminals, stopping the noise. “It's a legitimate question; SHIELD requires that if you're gonna be loitering around on earth, I need to have a complete medical and anatomical profile on you, no holds barred. I also need to know in case your brother and Foster decide to want any little godlings running around and they need _help_.”

Sif thinks, and the sound of little feet is music to her ears, though she cannot discern why. It catches her off-guard, and her eyes follow the curve of Loki's throat.

“And don't worry about scaring me,” Stark says. “I've done some fucking weird-as-hell shit and there is nothing you can say that will faze me. Anything weird? Extra parts, tentacles, color-changes, freaky Avatar tails I can't see?”

“I can assure you there is nothing _deviant_ about the mating of _Jötunn_ and _Æsir_ ,” the God remarks, his voice dark, a bite in his throat.

“ _Mating_? You make it sounds like we're talking about animals in a zoo,” Tony whines. “Next thing you'll tell me is that your societies have dominance hierarchies and females go into estrus.”

“Part of that statement is true, Stark.” The billionaire freezes, turning to look at the God again, slightly disturbed by the thin line of his lips in a sneer-like smile.

“So you either have an alpha-beta-omega system hardwired into your brain or your girlfriend is going to potentially go into heat at some point in time, in _my tower_ no less,” Tony muses, brow tilted in hesitant belief. “But you're the God of Lies, so how do I know which one of those is true?”

“You don't.”

“And I'm going to assume that's the fun part,” Stark drawls, somewhat mortified by the God's conniving behavior.

“A woman of the _Æsir_ is only fertile once every decade,” Loki begins, and Tony is instantaneously curious, grabbing his tablet from off one of the counters and typing furiously. “But for mortals, all of Yggdrasill's children are exceedingly long-lived, and do not need to reproduce so quickly.”

“Human women are fertile once a month,” Tony comments, “and we now have seven billion people running around on earth. You'd think we could learn from you guys.”

“An entire life for one of your kind is the blink of an eye to us,” Loki continues, “so it is no surprise that offspring are born to you so quickly.”

“But we don't exactly go through _pon farr_ every seven years,” the billionaire quips.

“Ásgarðr is a realm of war,” the God explains. “Its population has been decimated many times in its thirst for power and glory. The mating drive ensures the continuation of the _Æsir_ beyond the losses of the battlefield.”

“So you guys need some way to repopulate after you bite off more than you can chew,” Tony muses, fingers lightning-quick over the tablet screen. “Anything else I should know? Is Sif going to lock you in her rooms for a week and then rip off your head after she's done with you? Some creatures on earth do that,” and Loki's brow furrows in mild disgust.

“We are not so animalistic, Stark.”

“I could hide a camera in your room and find out.”

The God of Mischief flicks a wrist, the wires and antennae attached to his body falling to the floor, clattering loud in the silence of the lab as all of the computers and machines shut down. His clothes slide down to the floor, shadows moving across the tile to envelop him as he stands, adorned in golds and greens and blacks once more.

“You would do well to see that you don't,” the God of Mischief growls, pupils thin and cat-like, breath hissed between his teeth. He turns his back on the billionaire, leaving the lab as silent as he had come.

Loki pauses outside the door, a scent lingering faint in the air, hot on his tongue.

“Does the Man of Iron appreciate your dramatic touch?” and Loki turns, tasting want and fire in his throat. Sif steps from around the corner, a knowing, sly smile on her face and Loki knows she's been watching, listening the entire time, _laughing_.

“Of course he does,” the God answers, pulling the warrior against him, her scent inviting and luxurious around him, fingers digging need into the cloth of her tunic. “He would not entreat and bribe me for more otherwise.” Sif's fingers tangle in the tails and braids of his long hair, pulling his forehead down to meet her own.

“What could a mortal possibly bribe a God with?” the warrior questions against his mouth, trailing her tongue across his bottom lip, pressing her teeth into the angle of his jaw.

“He feeds my love of designer scarves, I feed his love of xenobiological study, and everything,” he says, fingers tugging her hair, pulling her mouth to his again, “is perfectly,” his hound-teeth scrape her cheek, kisses heated against her skin, “fine.”

Loki turns them both and lifts her, pressing Sif into the glass, rocking his hips into hers as he holds one of her hands against the window. Her mouth is hot against his own, something simmering beneath her skin, prickling against his own when they touch. There is a restlessness in her movements, in the curve of her fingers into his leathers and the husky sound of her breath in his ears. Something burns faint in her bones, a fire not yet stoked to fullness, and it makes him want her all the more.

The God presses himself into the warrior's body, her legs tight around his hips, digging into his back. He meets Stark's eyes through the thick glass as Sif digs her teeth into the crook of his neck, fingers yanking the high collar of his coat out of the way. The billionaire spreads his arms in disbelief and Loki knows the expression on his own face is sinfully debauched, and he moans loud enough for Stark to hear through the glass, rutting against Sif, eyes never leaving the scientist's.

Sif's hand trails down his front, pawing at his too-tight trousers and Loki's breath catches in his throat, giving Stark a feral, conniving grin as a flick of his wrist sends them to their rooms.

Tony crosses his arms, irritated, stomping away to find the most powerful glass cleaner in the tower.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _miðgarðr_ – old norse form of the anglicized 'midgard'.
> 
>  _æsir_ – old norse plural for the people of asgard; marvel calls them asgardians, but I prefer the original term.
> 
>  
> 
> [a great icosahedron](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_icosahedron)
> 
>  
> 
>  _yggdrasill_ – old norse form of the anglicized 'yggdrasil'.
> 
>  _pon farr_ \- in _star trek_ , _pon farr_ is a psychophysical condition affecting vulcans, in which vulcan males and females go into heat every seven years, going into a blood fever, becoming violent, and finally dying if they do not mate with someone with whom they are empathically bonded or engage in the ritual battle known as _kal-if-fee_. the idea is based on the mating ritual of animals on earth, notably the ferret that also dies if it has not mated by the end of the season.
> 
>  _ásgarðr_ – old norse form of the anglicized asgard, meaning 'enclosure of the _æsir_ '.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In which team dinners are fun and educational experiences.

Among the intrusive experiments and embarrassing (or amusing) inquiries into their biology, the one Tony had found most important to complete first had been the one on dietary concerns and nutrition. While it seemed like those of Asgard could and would eat just about anything put in front of them, he had discovered that certain foods had alarming effects, both to the positive and the negative. On the whole, of course, they seemed to enjoy whatever food of Midgard was placed in front of them, and in large enough quantities to make Tony bemoan the fact he had had to install both a walk-in fridge and a freezer in order to make sure there was enough for Thor, Sif, and Loki to eat at any one time.

For all its strangeness, though, Midgard had access to a wide variety of spices and flavors. Though the mortals seemed to find it bizarre to combine some of them, Sif had thus far no complaints with what was readily available, or what was prepared… which was why, when she had done little but stare at her plate since she had piled food onto it, the others took note and began to ask questions.

“Is something wrong with the food?” Steve asked, somewhat worriedly; he was a kind man, a good warrior, and Sif was most pleased knowing him. He cared for those he knew as any good commander would.

“Are _you_ feeling all right?” was Bruce’s question, another man with a curiously strong desire to watch over others. Sif shook her head, and made herself pull a piece of chicken off the whole bird and take a bite. Once she had it was as though she had not eaten in days, and she tore into the meat eagerly.

“I am all right,” she replied, once she’d chewed and swallowed her mouthful. Warrior she might be but Sif had been taught manners from the moment she could understand and remember, and even here in this place of relatively lax etiquette she would not act the uncouth bumpkin. Perhaps, if her suspicions were correct, keeping that in mind would become much more important soon. “There is nothing wrong with the food, Captain Rogers, it is quite flavorful.”

“It’d better be, you put half the spice rack on it,” Tony yelled. He was still in the kitchen, fussing with his own food. “I made sure to keep my lettuce far away from it.”

“You learn quickly, Tony Stark.” Thor made his entrance – there was no other way to put it, for even in his dressed-down leathers, the God of Thunder commanded attention the moment he walked into any room. Surprisingly enough Loki was at his side. As much as Thor had been trying to repair their relationship, the jury was still out on if Loki was having any of it. The fact they were in the same room together, and that Loki didn’t look murderous or sullen, was a good sign. Thor was effusive, too. He’d have been much more subdued if the two of them had been arguing again. “Why mortals put that vile plant on so many of their dishes…”

“It does not make _them_ sick up,” Loki pointed out. He’d made a beeline for the food laid out on yellow dishes – yellow meant Asgardian-sized portions – and was filling a plate with enough food to keep both Clint and Tony full for a day. “That could be why.”

Thor went to fill his own plate. “I thought that much was obvious—Loki,” and continuing on quickly to hide his near slip of _brother_ which would surely have put the God of Mischief into a mood, “In any case, the meal certainly smells delicious enough without it.”

Only because he was looking, Tony saw something flicker across Loki’s face. It was gone in an instant, the usual haughty indifference back in place, but it had been there. “Something does smell appetizing,” he agreed, and took his plate back to the table, sliding in beside Sif.

Whenever Loki actually ate with them, the mood always shifted subtly, became more tense and wary. She could not make them like Loki nor accept him on terms other than their own, and she did not want to, for the apprehension that was even now in their hearts had been in her own. Betimes, though, Sif did wonder if it made the path toward whatever peace would be granted to him even longer and harder than it already was. Indeed the only two besides herself who seemed wholly comfortable with Loki were Thor and Tony, and Sif was fairly certain the latter was because Tony had a very small sense of self-preservation.

For her part, Sif let her knee fall over to rest against Loki’s thigh as they sat together. As of late, touching him in any way had made heat curl low in her belly, caused sparks to dance along her skin. She certainly hadn’t been a stranger to desire for the God before, but this was more than desire or lust or the barely-acknowledged, deeper feelings they held for each other. “Must be the peppers they put in our food,” she murmured softly, and grinned when Loki nearly dropped the forkful of food that had been halfway to his mouth. “I jest, of course. Steve Rogers knows your unique requirements.”

“Your wit grows daily,” Loki muttered, but shifted so their thighs were pressed together. Sparks tickled up her spine, and Sif tightened her grip on her fork as she pulled another piece of meat away from the bird, as she leaned over, putting her lips close to his ear. Had he always smelled so good?

“I have an expert to teach me.”

Loki turned his head toward her slightly; she could see the glint of blue-green in the corners of his eyes, the slight tilt to the corner of his mouth, lips that she had kissed hungrily not hours before, seeking some respite from the strange fire that grew steadily in her bones. She watched as the tip of his tongue slipped out, wetting them to speak. “Truly, my lady,” he told her, “You have little need of instruction.”

“Are you two going to go at it on the table or something? Because if you are, I need to like, get my tablet to make notes.”

They didn’t spring apart – there was no guilt or shame in what they had and thus no reason to act as though there was – but Loki leaned back away from her, and Sif had to stop herself from making a low, displeased noise in the back of her throat. She did not _want_ Loki to move far away. She wanted to keep him close, to keep a watch upon him, to make sure that others did not—

“I believe it was in our little agreement that anything furthering your quaint projects exploring the wondrous biology of extraterrestrial allies would occur in a laboratory,” Loki was saying in a silky tone of voice when she came back to the conversation. The slightly hissing undercurrent of irritation made Sif’s toes curl against the balls of her feet inside her boots. “And this is not an offer to _perform_ in one of your machines, so do not jump to any conclusions.”

Tony spread his hands. “Look, all I was saying was that you looked like you wanted to throw her down on the table right in front of all of us,” he said, ignoring Thor’s strangled noise, “And if you were going to do that I wanted you to hold off until I could get something to scribble on, because you didn’t give me a chance when you started going at it against the windows of the lab before you poofed away.”

Thor made another, more alarmed strangled noise. Most everyone else just looked mildly embarrassed, and Sif pressed her lips together before her smile got much wider. “I am not much of an exhibitionist, I fear,” she told Tony. “I am much hungrier than I am in need of a romp on the table.”

“Good. I don’t know how things are done in Space Viking Land but we _eat_ here.”

“We are not _barbarians_ , Stark.” Loki was back to looking more or less unruffled, taking deliberate bites of food to show how unruffled he was, though Sif could tell by the set of his jaw between bites that this was not really the case. “Rutting like animals without consideration for the _venue._ ”

“Loki, _please_ ,” Thor managed. He was looking very red in the face.

“ _You_ are not blameless in this matter at all.” The Trickster appeared not to notice or care that the God of Thunder was turning a shade to match the accents of his gear, instead turning his attention to his own meal. “You ought to have hidden yourself better that time, Thor. Believe you me, walking round a column to see you fumbling Alwilda was a sight I could have gone eternity without.”

From the snorts around the room, the other Avengers could not help agreeing with Loki. Even Clint was cracking a grin, and he rarely did anything of the sort when it was his erstwhile and unasked-for leader delivering it. 

Tony, scenting an untapped reservoir of amusement, swung his head round toward his teammate. “It appears we have a playboy in our midst!”

“ _Another_ playboy,” Clint muttered, dipping a piece of his steak quesadilla into some salsa.

“I suppose the distinction is that Thor’s exploits took place on other planets.”

“Mine haven’t only because I haven’t gotten a chance yet!”

“I cannot speak for her,” Sif interjected, “But I believe the Lady Pepper would have many objections to Tony indulging himself on Asgard or any of the other realms.”

“Guys – and girls, _please_ ,” Tony whined. “The point is that we have two sources of excellently embarrassing stories about our esteemed godly teammate, and _we haven’t asked them anything about it._ I for one will not let this stand.”

“You may ask all the questions you like, Tony Stark,” Sif told him sweetly, “But a lady never tells, and whatever my profession, I am very much a lady.”

Steve gave Tony a look over the rim of his glass. “If they don’t want to tell, Stark, quit trying to drag it out of them.”

“How will I know they don’t want to tell if I don’t try? Great innovations, Rogers, were made by inquiring minds pushing the boundaries of science.”

“I think it’s pretty obvious, personally.” Natasha’s voice was level – as level as the watchful gaze she’d kept on Loki from the moment he walked into the room.

“None of you have even the slightest curiosity? Nobody?”

“I would be far more content with my youthful transgressions remaining in my youth,” Thor grumbled. “I wish you had not brought it up, Loki.”

“One can only use the tools at one’s disposal.”

Somehow, it managed to be one of the more civil conversations they had ever had since Sif came to spend large parts of her time on Midgard. It gave her hope, really, to see it – the Avengers talking almost normally, even with Loki there, and he even participating and getting in comments of his own that made the rest smile or laugh. These moments were rare, but it was as though she saw parts of the Loki she had grown up with when they happened, and it gave her hope. Not for a full return to that man, for too much had changed in him, too much had been given over to the dark between the stars and the endless blue of a thing that ought never have been created. Sif was more pragmatic than that, and she wished only for contentment. If her suppositions were correct, too, he would need a very even keel for what was about to come. They both would.

“It is time for me to retire for the evening. I thank you all for the meal,” she said politely, rising and sorting the detritus of her meal into the appropriate waste containers. There were still several helpings left on the plates they had all drawn from, and she had to quash the desire to take what was left back to her room. _Not yet,_ a part of her whispered. _Not just yet. Things are not yet ready for it._

With a last bow, a half-second of meeting Loki’s eyes, Sif left the common room. She had much to think on tonight.

*

Tony watched Loki watch Sif leave. It was always _fascinating_ to see the aliens interacting – as similar as they looked, they were _definitely_ alien in their mannerisms and the customs they seemed insistent upon adhering to. Biology aside, if he’d put much stock in the humanities, he’d probably have found them just as interesting a study as when he was analyzing the structure of their neurotransmitters with Bruce.

But there was something else going on here. Loki had gone very still and watchful, more than he usually was even when his space girlfriend was involved, and looking closely – was he _sniffing the air_? Come to that, Thor seemed just as watchful. If their ears could perk forward, Tony figured they would have been. Thor seemed almost uncomfortable, though, more than even Loki’s little jab about his teenage romps had made him.

“Loki?” he said at last. There was an odd note in his voice, and Loki’s expression became sly and dangerous in the split second between when he broke his concentration and when he settled his gaze on his adopted brother. 

_That_ put Tony on alert. He poked Loki all the time in the lab, out of the lab, whenever he felt like it really, but he never let himself forget how deadly the God really was. Whatever that look meant… and the others had picked up on it too. Natasha had uncrossed her ankles and leaned forward. Shifting her weight innocuously into position to launch herself across the table at Loki’s throat if she had to. Steve had put down his fork and was watching closely. Bruce was edging toward the door.

Thor seemed to have caught it too, because he shook his head. “You know I will not interfere, if it is so.”

“I do not know of any other explanation.” Loki’s voice was frosty, but there was something – a slight easing of the tension between them, a shift in the way he held his shoulders. “Your assurances are certainly unnecessary, however.”

“I merely wanted to—“

“I know what you wanted.” Loki bent his head and took another bite of what was left on his plate. “I already know.”

Thor’s jaw worked as though he wanted to say something else, to continue, but finally he nodded shortly. “Then it is settled. Perhaps I ought to leave with Jane when she makes her trip to Culver, however.”

“It may be best.”

Tony pointed two fingers at them. “What’s going on here?”

“Nothing that concerns you.”

“It’s going on in _my_ tower.”

“And yet it is none of your business.” Loki gave him a wide, pointed smile, all white teeth and irritation. “Fascinating how that works.” He rose, going over to the food out on the counter to select second helpings.

Tony sat back in his chair and glowered at the Trickster’s back. Something was going on, and he was going to find out what. It was only a matter of time.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> contains copious amounts of tony stark, pizza rolls as contraband, and bruce and sif being total bros
> 
> we're getting freaky here when we say alien biology we're not fucking around

_Soon_ , Sif thinks, as she pops yet another grape into her mouth. This is far from the first time she has felt the itch beneath her skin, and it will be long before the cycles cease; were she on Ásgarðr, the warrior could simply go to the palace healers and ask for the spells that calm the Heat until its return, or for the magick that leaves her barren so that she may quell her desires without promise of children.

Sif fingers the last fruit from the rather large bowl before her, contemplating. To last the cycle without aid of magic would almost certainly result in a little warrior or spellcrafter in a few months' time. Loki has the magick and the means to stop the entire process before it truly starts, but something has her unsure. She crushes the strawberry between her teeth, and its juice prickles her tongue.

Though many choose to think it, Sif did not renounce her maidenhood along with her position in the court. She is a woman like any other, and her preference for smooth leather and hardened steel over shimmering gowns and gaudy jewels bears no weight on her familial instinct; in her heart of hearts the warrior wants her own family, her own sons and daughters in which she can instill all of the love and courage and strength that carried her from her mother's arms into the armor that fits worn and well upon her shoulders.

“That bowl of fruit was just full like five minutes ago; are our puny earth calories not godly enough?”

Sif turns her head at the sound of Tony Stark's voice, and she can smell him before she sees him, another warning of her impending condition. The scent of metal and fire follows him wherever he goes like an invisible cloak, trailing after his every step. It is a comforting scent, reminding the warrior of the forges of Ásgarðr and the shops of the metalsmiths.

“Are you planning to hibernate or something?” the brunet asks, pressing a few buttons on the oven and peeking into the much smaller freezer designated for the humans in the tower. Sif scoffs even as she looks back inside the bowl, realizing he's right. _Perhaps the Time is closer than I had thought._

“And if you are,” Stark continues, pulling out a brightly-colored box and setting it on the counter in front of Sif, “would you be so kind as to do so in my lab so that I have all the gadgets I could possibly need right on hand?”

“You really are like a child at a table of sweets,” Sif laughs at him, and the lingering flicker of Pepper's perfume touches her nose like an inkstain on the brunet's skin. It is a marker to her now where it hadn't been before, a warning to potential trespassers, and she wills the primal part of her instincts to shut up for the time being.

“How many people who aren't me have ever sat down with an alien and played Wii? Or eaten pizza? Or fought the baddie of the week?” Stark taps his finger nervously on the box between them both. “I promise I wouldn't poke you too much,” and Sif knows this is the billionaire's way of saying _sorry for wanting to drag you into the lab so often but don't worry I don't actually think of you as a walking science experiment._

“It's alright,” Sif says, waving the scientist's awkward apology away. “Humans are just as interesting to observe and interact with, if not slightly confusing.” The warrior tilts her head to read the box still lying on the counter, curious. “Pizza rolls?”

“Romanova is addicted to these things,” Stark says, turning it right side up to show the dark-haired woman. “If she catches us eating them she'll probably castrate me with her bare hands.”

“What about me?”

“You're her alien warrior sister-in-arms with more weaponry than a seven-nation army and more knowledge of fighting than our puny brains can probably ever hold,” Tony drawls. “You'll be perfectly safe.”

“Ah. I'll have some, then,” Sif decides, a sly tilt to her brows and a smile spread across her face.

“There's a catch,” Tony says, emptying the small box onto a sheet and sticking it inside the oven. “For every one you eat, you have to tell me a cool alien fact.”

“A _cool alien fact_?”

“Something that either I haven't learned about you in my lab, or that I wouldn't be able to learn without shooting your boy-toy with a tranq gun and strapping him to a table.”

The smell of the pizza rolls is already tickling her nose, and the warrior's stomach growls with renewed ferocity. Sif smiles, sly and sleek.

“Deal.”

 

 

“In addition,” she continues, “your sense of smell is almost nonexistent in comparison to ours. For example, the smell of steel and fire follows your every step, which tells me you are probably a craftsman of some kind. Also,” and the warrior leans forward slightly, her brows furrowed in concentration, “the echo of your Pepper's perfume hangs like a warning to interested parties, and there is a certain heaviness to your scent that tells me you are male before I even see you.”

Tony watches Sif pop yet another pizza roll into her mouth, lamenting the nearly-empty tray for a few seconds before remembering that he's talking biology with an alien and wait 'till Bruce sees all these notes an _what could possibly be cooler than this_ ???

“My stomach is regretting this entire exchange but my brain is singing your praises,” he remarks, sliding to a blank page on his tablet and jotting down another curtain of notes.

“I suppose I should leave some for you,” the warrior says, grabbing a napkin and wiping the delicious grease from her fingers. “I wouldn't want to you to suffer Lady Natasha's wrath without enjoying at least some of the spoils.”

“Are you eating my pizza rolls, Stark?”

“Speak of the fucking devil,” Tony whispers, shoving a handful into his mouth and turning his back, continuing to type.

“No,” he replies, but a mouthful of pizza rolls prevents him from saying much of anything and it comes out as _'nghoouuhgn'_ instead. 

The Black Widow's lips are turned up in a smirk as she enters, having caught the billionaire in the act, and she takes a seat beside Sif. The assassin is dressed in loose clothes and smells like the afterglow of sweat and soap and her cheeks are tinged warm with pink. The metallic prickle of blood stings Sif's nose. She can feel her pupils darken to pinpoints, the taste of Loki's blood and sweat an afterimage on her tongue, and she squashes the warmth in her belly like one of Midgarðr's disgusting little centipedes.

“Stark informed me that you would castrate him for eating your pizza rolls.”

“I hadn't thought of that before, but I'll keep that in mind,” Romanova replies, plucking a few of the small triangles off the tray, her brows raised and eyes staring a hole into the brunet's back.

“Why would you tell her that?” he whines, turning around, fingers flying over the tablet. “I thought what we had was special, Sif.”

“Evidently not,” Natasha laughs, gesturing to Sif and the tray. The warrior shakes her head and the assassin takes the tray from the counter, sliding off the chair. “You owe me a new box, Stark.”

“Tell me something I don't know,” he replies. “Why don't you go find Cupid and have hot animalistic assassin sex and feed each other pizza rolls,” he shouts to her retreating form.

“Way ahead of you, Stark.”

 

 

The sun is glimmering gold against the painter's palette sky of blues and purples and reds, glittering bright as it dips beneath the horizon. Clouds flow across the rainbow expanse as if made by an artist's brush, the leaves of Yggdrasill's Branches streaking through the colors and leaving their mark behind.

 _Móðir_ drips from her teeth like water, runs cool down her arms, spreads beneath her fingers to the soft carpet as she clears her mind, and Sif's pupils are cat-dark, endless.

The warrior is no scholar, content with the smell of ink and the dripping candles of a library's corners; her mind is not at peace with court politics, nor is she content for the weight of gold and jewels upon her hands instead of armor and leather over her shoulders.

She is War, and battle hums beneath her skin, takes root deep inside her bones. When mortals still believed in Ásgarðr, their prayers echoed inside her head, draped down her back like cloth, and she wrapped herself in them; they were her strength, and she fed upon them like an animal, blood dripping hot down her throat.  
There are no prayers left for her now, but something more than War pulses in her veins, claws through the sinew of her muscles, makes her yearn, makes her need. It burns down her back, slides slick between her legs and down to her toes, and if Loki has felt teeth in her kisses more than before, he has not said, but the warrior knows.  
Sif has had an inkling of what the itch beneath her calloused fingers may be, but after sparring with Rogers and Natasha the day before, she can no longer deny the burning behind her eyes, the prickle deep within her belly. She had thought it would dissipate with the heat of a good fight, that it was only the longing for battle that slithered untamed through her limbs, but she can fool herself no more.

 _The Time_ , she thinks, and bows her head further to the Great _Móðir_ , to the honor that has been given her, the itch beneath her fingers that is her power to beget life and death, always and in all ways.

The stars fade into the setting sun, growing brighter with the heat behind her throat, and Sif digs her nails into the carpet like claws.

Sitting up the warrior stretches, her arms spread wide to the sky before she runs her hands through the thick hair, the dark waves curling over her shoulders. The summer heat is beginning to wane, giving way to the cooler autumn air, and Sif watches as the night comes quicker than the weeks before. The scent of chemicals and the sterility of Stark's laboratories hits her nose, and she knows Doctor Banner is joining her on the rooftop penthouse.

“Am I disturbing you?” he asks, voice quiet and gentle amidst the hum of New York beneath them.

“Do not worry, Doctor,” Sif greets him, crossing her legs and turning her head. “I was only meditating in the cooler night air. I dare not try to in the scorching day.”

“What are Asgardian practices like? If you don't mind my asking,” the brunet says, taking a seat on on of the chairs, a thick book resting in his lap.

“Much like those of Midgarðr I imagine,” Sif explains. “It's an integral part of our society, not only as warriors but as children of Yggdrasill.”

“The World Tree?”

“Yes!” and Sif's eyes alight at the opportunity to speak of her. “From the waters of Yggdrasill were the beings of the Nine Realms born, and it is to her Branches that we return when our days reach their end. She is _Móðir_ to all, and there are many festivals amidst the Realms that honor her, where we give thanks to Yggdrasil for all that she has given us.” The flame in her belly flickers, her honor, and she digs her nails into her palm.

“Is something wrong?” Bruce asks, and in the New York night Sif's pupils are endless and wide. She hasn't even told Loki of her condition, but the warrior suspects even Thor has already guessed, and the humans will begin to wonder as well. She knows Loki can smell it on her, the flicker beneath her belly, can feel it in her touch and taste it on her tongue. But something about the Doctor makes her want to tell him, makes her want to confide in him and seek his advice.

“Nothing is wrong,” the warrior begins, “but it is something delicate, to be handled carefully.”

“It is the Time,” she says, meeting the scientist's eyes. “It is the window when I am able to conceive a child. And I am unsure of what to do.”

“Have you been through this before?” Banner asks, and the gentle curiosity in his voice is a comfort. “Is there anything you need that we can help you with?”

“Many times,” Sif answers, waving the brunet's worry away. “A woman of Ásgarðr is fertile only once every ten years; we are a long-lived people, and from even the earliest times, have had no need to reproduce as quickly as humans do. But we are also a warrior people, and Ásgarðr has been decimated by war many times in its ancient history. The mating drive ensures that our people survive beyond the losses of the battlefield, but do not overpopulate our Realm, as it is much smaller than earth.”

“It would be child's play for Loki to perform the spells that would keep the Heat from beginning, but I am finding it harder and harder to convince myself that I should ask him to,” Sif continues. “I know he can tell it will be soon, and no doubt by now even Thor can as well.”

“Many people think that when I took up my sword and shield, I left my womanhood behind,” Sif goes on. “But my father is long gone to Valhalla, and my mother did not live long without him. Besides Heimdallr, who is brother to me beyond the ties of blood, I have no other family. Thor and the Warriors Three are like brothers to me, but it is not the same.”

“I have never given much thought to children until now, and though I prefer the weight of a sword in my hands to that of a child, I cannot deny that I want a family of my own just as much as I want to protect the one I have now.”

“There's nothing wrong with wanting more,” the brunet says, and Sif smiles, hanging her head in blushing gratitude. “But there is the question of Loki, I'm going to assume,” Banner adds.

“Question is not the word to even begin to describe him,” Sif laughs, pulling the sleeves of her sweater down as the night wind begins to strengthen. “He is prideful, jealous, petty, infuriating, and far too full of himself for his own good.”

“Anything else?” Banner grins, and Sif buries a laugh in her fists.

“But he is caring in his own begrudging way, he has a wit sharper than any blade in my collection, he is fiercely protective, and I see so much of him in myself that it's disgusting and invigorating all at once.” Sif pulls her knees to her chest, resting her chin on the soft fabric of her pants.

“Are a viciously proud warrior and a fickle-yet-seductive liesmith really a good idea for parents?” she asks, raising a playful brow at the scientist.

“There's only one way to find out,” he responds. “Something tells me it would be useless to lie to a Trickster God.”

“He has the infuriating ability to know when someone is lying,” Sif laughs, watching the brunet get up from his seat, his book unopened under his arm.

“I want to thank you for listening to me, as strange as this all may seem to you with how alien our people really are.”

“It's not strange, it's only different, and there's never anything wrong with that,” Banner replies, turning towards the door into the tower. “And thank you for trusting me, and letting me help you, even if it was just listening.” Sif tilts her head, the waves of her dark hair spilling down her shoulder, her expression curious.

“Why wouldn't I?”

“Most people don't trust me very easily on principle.”

“Well it's a good thing I'm not most people,” Sif says, her smile brighter than the lights of the New York horizon.

 

 

Loki looks out the walls of the tower onto the penthouse, the fiery lights of the city stretched across the glass like smears of paint.

Sif's back is to him as she watches the night sky, the flickering Branches of Yggdrasill visible to both of them, spread out across the inky black. Her hair blows in the breeze and he watches her pull the sleeves of her sweater down over her hands, sitting with her legs crossed and her head tilted towards the sky.

The lingering scent of her is sweet on his tongue, tinged with heat and want and his eyes are cat-like even in the ink of the New York night. He can taste the Heat on her skin, feel it in her kisses and the marks her nails leave in his skin. In the past she has come to him by now, has asked for the spells that leave her barren while she licks his throat and draws her teeth over his jugular.

Loki watches as the warrior kneels, her head bowed to the Great _Móðir_ above them and her fingers spread like claws into the soft carpet beneath her. 

He will wait for her to come to him, and he will bare his throat to her, whether she asks of his magick or not.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i speak russian and it does this thing where last names almost always differ depending on gender; so if you're a girl your last name will be different than if you were a boy; so whenever you see 'natasha romanov', that's not technically correct, as '-ov' is the ending a boy would have; i use 'romanova' because that's what it would be for an actual person, because '-ova' is the ending for a girl (this is also the case with women marrying and taking the feminine variant of their husband's last name, i.e tolstoy/tolstaya)
> 
> are you smitten with the idea of natasha walking like a sass master away from tony with a tray of pizza rolls on her way to bang clint barton because we are
> 
> yeah we like to write about aliens doing the biological imperative like come on marvel where's all the weird biology do i have to get my entire alien fix from star trek THESE ARE LITERAL ALIENS YO LET'S HAVE SOME FUN


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> arguments with pointy objects always go so well.
> 
> also a note on the translations: we literally just ran the lines of dialog through google translate, which is the cheap and dirty way of doing things and is awful grammatically, so we apologize in advance for all errors as neither one of us speaks Icelandic or Norse. Translations can be found at the end of the chapter.

When she caught herself with a folded blanket in her arms, Sif knew a decision could not be delayed much longer.

She’d meant to go to one of her favored spots in the tower, a place she could go and read – the works of Midgard’s generals, the world’s history. People thought Loki the only one interested in putting his nose in books but Sif knew that studying the minds of those who came before was how one improved and remained fresh, and she had learned not to discount Midgard for simply being a realm of mortals. She read in places where she could look out over the city that was so like and unlike her home… but she had left her book somewhere forgotten, and was halfway to the suite of rooms she shared with Loki.

_It begins already,_ Sif thought, carrying the blanket back out to the living area, sitting heavily on the couch. _Or else I am much farther along than I thought, nearly ready to court, and…_ She ran her hands through her hair. If her behavior had already shifted into a pattern of preparatory actions, into making ready a comfortable place for her and her chosen partner for the week of sequestration... she had a rapidly closing window to work in and no time at all to indulge in more contemplation, and yet there was still conflict in her heart. She had to choose her path and set her feet upon it and start walking.

In the past it had been simple to stop her heat or close her womb, no matter at all, but now… now, the thought of stopping what had begun was abhorrent, and her hesitancy in rendering herself barren for this cycle said much to her. She took a new tack, laying out her options.

_Return to Asgard; without the reason for being hesitating, the paralysis will lift._ Sif discarded this right off. She had rarely backed down, and the thought of abandoning her lover in such a callous way was unthinkable. Loki would be devastated, thinking himself alone and unwanted once more, and the thought of what he could do in such a state – given the _last_ time he’d felt such a way – was not one she enjoyed musing upon. Sif refused to be the reason he backslid so far.

_Hide away for the duration; sequester yourself on Midgard or some other realm and wait out the heat._ She had tried this before and it had been utter agony to deny the heat when it was upon her. Physical pain and mental anguish, when compared with the alternative, were hardly the choices she wanted to make. Sif refused to let herself remain paralyzed or to hide away from difficulty.

_Put off your want for a child until another time._ A simple and tantalizingly easy option. But Sif wondered if ten years would bring any changes to her mindset, or to Loki’s. Those who lived so long had only rare reasons to change quickly. She did not want to wait only to arrive back in the same place.

_So make up your mind._

Sif leaned against the back of the couch, staring across the city. She and Thor – and Loki, for that matter – were born into the heart of a bitter war and great uncertainty, and their parents had certainly not hesitated to bring them into the world. Was it truly that she doubted her ability to care for a child, if she desired it so strongly?

Sif exhaled slowly, cradling her answer in her mind. She _wanted_ Loki’s child, _had_ wanted it for some time. But she could not force it upon him. Even if it had not gone against her own sensibilities, Asgard frowned upon such practices. They would enter into this together, or not at all. They could prove that death-dealing and life-giving were but two sides of the same coin.

Her plan set now, Sif rose. She would find Loki and speak with him, and then together they would tell the others (who deserved to know they would soon be playing host to a pair of courting Asgardians in thrall of the heat), and then she could give in to her instinct and begin preparing for what was to come.

*

Steve was not the “leader” of the Avengers, no matter what anyone said. He looked out for his team, whether they wanted him to or not, gave direction and advice, but never presumed to call himself their leader. Still, he couldn’t help but worry when he came into a room and found everyone clustered around a monitor, looking grim.

“What’s going on?” he asked. Bruce looked up.

“Sif and Loki are, uh… talking, I guess,” he said.

“Two floors up,” Natasha added.

“And it’s going sideways,” Clint finished.

The words _Loki_ and _sideways_ would have been enough to concern Steve, but add in _Sif_ and he felt concern become alarm. “Do we have audio in there, Stark?”

“Are you suggesting I spy on private conversations in my penthouse?” Tony said, affecting shock, but he was already pressing icons and buttons and after a soft crackle, the audio kicked in through the speakers around the room. A stream of the strange language the Asgardians used between themselves streamed out. Thor twitched, and everyone looked at him.

“Translation, Beowulf?”

Thor shook his head, looking uncomfortable. “Better that you not know.”

“Oh, _come on_ , Thor—“

“It is of a… very private nature. I’m sure you can discern the general mood.” Thor watched the monitor, watched Sif stabbing the air with a finger and Loki making a dismissive gesture after whatever she’d said, his expression irritated. “It is not my place to discuss what they wish to keep between themselves.”

“They’re shouting at each other,” Clint said. “I’m not sure it’s going to _stay_ between the two of them much longer.”

Sif’s voice, even with the strange syllables of Asgard’s tongue, was icy and clipped. Loki responded sarcastically, and Thor shifted uneasily. On his other side, so did Natasha, and they shared a look.

“This is _really_ uncomfortable,” Tony said a little too loudly. “I like potentially violent arguments to be in a language I _know_.”

“Do you really need to know anything beyond that it’s bad and getting worse?” Natasha asked.

“It’s in _my tower_ , Natasha—“

“But it’s between them—“

“Won’t be for—woah!” Clint jerked back as Sif lunged forward, her face twisted in rage at something Loki had said to her. The God of Mischief caught one of her fists but missed the other, and his head snapped back hard. “Uh, Thor?” the archer muttered. “Is that _normal?_ ”

“No,” Thor replied, his hand gripping Mjolnir’s handle. “No. We need to intervene. This is beginning to get out of hand.”

“ ‘Beginning’?” Bruce muttered as a flash of green light and a yelp from Sif indicated a thrown spell.

“They’re trashing the place,” Tony whined. “Are they _hissing?_ ” There weren’t any words coming over the feed anymore, just a lot of smashing and the sizzle of magic, and what noises Sif and Loki were making themselves.

“Jesus,” Clint said, leaning forward. “Does she have a _knife?_ ”

“That’s it,” Thor said, and began whirling Mjolnir. Tony caught on to what he was doing and started trying to reach across Clint to grab at Thor’s arms.

“Don’t you fucking dare smash a hole in my—fuck!” Thor had hurled himself straight up through the ceiling, and a crash a couple seconds later indicated he’d smashed through the next floor too. “God _fucking_ damn it, these fucking Asgardians, I _swear to fucking fuck—_ ”

They all crammed into the stairwell, taking the risers two and three at a time, the sounds of crashing and fighting getting louder until they emerged out onto the floor and had to duck as Loki slammed into the wall beside them. A silver streak became a knife as it whistled through the air and stuck into the wall, and Loki yanked it out before lunging forward again. 

Thor grabbed him as he passed by and hauled back on the collar of his coat. Loki stumbled and nearly went down as his brother held him back, and he didn’t go easily, hissing and spitting invectives in their alien language. Steve and Tony grabbed Sif’s arms as she stalked forward, but Clint had to grip her wrist and twist it to get her to drop the knife in her hand and help hold her back. Even then they strained until a sharp command from Thor made her go still, her eyes flashing anger at Loki and her limbs quivering in rage.

“Pretty sure that meant _shut up_ in Runespeak,” Tony said, but everyone was too busy keeping their eyes on the Asgardians to make a reply.

Thor eyed Sif and asked something; she tilted her chin up proudly and snapped a reply.

“You can let go of her,” Thor said. Warily they did, and though she still shook, she stayed rooted to the spot. Loki muttered something that sounded mocking and condescending. Sif’s fingers twitched for where a knife was sheathed at the small of her back, but Thor jerked hard on Loki’s coat again; there was a quick whispered conversation of gibberish, and Thor let go of his brother. To be safe Steve kicked the knife she’d dropped to the floor out of her reach.

“My tower,” Tony groaned. “How many times will you people make me fix it up?”

“I ought to tell the _Alföðr_ of this,” Thor rumbled darkly. Loki’s laugh was wicked and sharp, his eyes still locked on Sif.

“Tattling to the _konungur_ ,” he said darkly. “Surely Odin will have a _very_ strong opinion of this, one of his _chattel_ wanting to _rut og bera helvítið börn og skrímsli_ \--”

Sif moved inhumanly fast, the knife blade singing as she drew it. Thor dragged Loki back further but she’d already nicked Loki’s throat with the edge, and as the three men pulled her off the trickster again Steve didn’t think the flush of her skin or the wide darkness of her pupils was entirely due to rage, and thought to himself that these aliens were _weird_ and Tony was right.

She was growling something in their language again, lapsing into English. “ _Þú aðgát aldrei fyrir hvers hagsmunum en þína eigin_ and I should have known better than to expect you to have _changed_ ,” she hissed, and Loki’s eyes narrowed, his body jerking as though he’d been slapped. Sif smirked at him and said something else in the Alltongue, and this time even Thor’s head snapped around.

“Sif,” he said warningly. “ _Það var ekki góður_.” She glared balefully at him but shut her mouth again.

“ _Einn hundur með tveimur herrum,_ ” Loki taunted, and Sif tried to get free again but gave in sullenly when she couldn’t wrest herself away. Thor had spun Loki to face him and they were speaking quietly and quickly, their voices rolling over vowels and long words with too many consonants. Loki would say something and Thor would argue with him until at last, Sif jerked her arms free with a noise of disgust.

“Do me the courtesy of speaking about me such that I can hear,” she told them. Thor said something to Loki again, a question, and then when Loki nodded he let go of Loki’s sleeves.

“You are both hurt,” Thor said. “But this madness must stop, _fyrir Sif er nálægt tíma sínum Loki, og hún hefur gert val hennar til að taka þig sem maka og ég er_ ánægð, _en þú verður að hlusta á hana og ekki segja henni svo._ ”

Loki waved a hand. “ _Hún talar um geðveiki sjálfi--_ ”

“Not madness,” Sif cut in frostily. “I have made my decision and seek your agreement, for I will have it no other way.”

“Why desire _barn á svikari?_ ”

“Because I—“ Sif seemed to falter, and Loki pounced on it.

“ _Ertu viss um að þú gætir jafnvel elska barn á öllum?_ ” he asked silkily.

Sif froze, her eyes widening in shock; then in a moment she had surged forward again, drawing one last knife into her hand. It hummed through the air between the two brothers and she followed its path, gripping Loki’s coat lapels in her fists and hauling him to his toes with the knife still quivering in the wall.

“Do not _ever_ question my convictions,” she snarled, “You who have no _hollusta_ , no _æra_ , and no _elska_ for anyone but _yourself_.” She pushed him back from her and stalked away, slamming the door to the stairwell. They could hear her boots clanging loudly on the way down, and then the room was silent. The Avengers exchanged tense looks; Thor was glaring at Loki. Loki was looking where Sif had disappeared.

“ _Alveg vitlaus_ ,” he muttered. Thor gripped Loki’s arm hard and Loki winced and pulled away.

Tony was peering at the trickster closely. “Are you _turned on?_ ” he asked incredulously. Loki gave him a withering look and vanished with a green shimmer of light. Thor passed a hand over his face and seemed to slump.

“What,” Bruce said from where he was shaking like a leaf by the bar, “was _that_.”

“I… it is not my place to say.” Thor seemed obviously uncomfortable with this thought. He had no idea Bruce knew, of course, and had been asking more after the fact that this seemed more like attempted homicide than any kind of courtship.

“Will it happen again?” Steve asked.

“I hope not. I will… speak with both of them. I apologize, of course, they should have known better than to do this…”

“All’s I ask is that if they’re going to kill each other can they do it on the tile, because blood doesn’t come out of carpet without scrubbing and chemicals, and—“ Tony caught Steve’s glare, and then Clint’s and Bruce’s and Natasha’s. “What? It’s a totally reasonable thing to ask.”

*

The inhabitants of the tower lapsed into a wary silence the rest of the day. Sif destroyed one of the training rooms before Natasha and Pepper coaxed her out to some excursion in the city with them. Loki had vanished completely, which was technically a violation of the agreement allowing him to remain on Earth. As long as he didn’t start any wars they’d all decided to respect his need for solitude. Of course, he hadn’t tried to kill his lover in a fight before, so this was all new territory for them.

When it got on toward evening Tony gave in to mounting curiosity and the increasingly demanding tone of Pepper’s text messages and asked JARVIS to track down Loki’s very unique biological signature.

“And tell me where in the city I’ll have to go to pick him up,” the engineer finished.

“Loki is still on the premises, sir.”

“What, really?”

“He is on the roof, and has been for several hours.”

Tony took the elevator and then the stairs to the roof, pushing open the heavy door to a rush of wind. For a moment he considered trying to sneak up to where Loki sat with his legs crossed and back straightened, doing his weird meditation thing. Then Loki shifted slightly.

“Come to mock me?” he asked darkly.

“The suit couldn’t get to me in time if I did. Besides, _you’re_ in a mood, and _I’m_ not suicidal.” He plopped down on the gravel beside Loki. “I’d ask what’s going on, but you probably wouldn’t tell me anyway, and then there’d be even more hurt feelings than there already are. So I’m taking you to dinner.”

“…I fail to follow your logic. Not that that is anything _new_ …”

“Sushi. Ever heard of it? Works well for you, given you already eat almost everything raw.”

“ _Stark_.”

“I’m taking you out to dinner – well, Pepper and I are, this was her idea – because you have a bangin’ hot space warrior for a girlfriend, one I _know_ has you trained to jump when she says, one you obviously care about and who, despite your megalomania, cares about you too—and you both just tried to kill each other. I want to know why.”

Loki tensed up, and Tony put his hands in the air.

“Not right now. Or ever, if you don’t want, because no matter how nosy I am about how all your parts work I’ve learned not to mess with space Vikings who don’t want to talk about their feelings.”

“Very well,” Loki said at last. “I will go.”

“Great. Half an hour. Put on normal clothes.”

“These _are_ normal clothes.”

“Non-bondage clothes. _Human_ clothes.”

“Rags,” Loki muttered, but rose. “Fine.”

He vanished. Tony waited a moment before ducking inside the stairwell again. “JARVIS?”

“Loki is in the forty-second floor library, sir. Reading the latest _Journal of Molecular Biology._ ”

“Oh,” Tony said after a moment. “As is custom.”

“If you say so, sir.”

*

Loki met them in the garage after exactly half an hour, dressed in a dark suit. 

“You look like you’re going to a funeral,” Tony told him. “This is supposed to be a fun outing of buddies.”

“Buddies?” Pepper said behind him, leaning on the door of her Audi sedan. Tony flapped a hand at her, and Loki raised an eyebrow.

“You said to wear human clothes.”

“I meant _jeans_.”

“Tony, Sayuri’s is too nice for jeans. Loki, you look fine. In the car, both of you.” Pepper slid behind the wheel, and Tony let Loki take shotgun – he generally disliked car trips, but complained less about ‘being ferried about in boxy metal death machines’ when he was able to easily see where they were going. Pepper smoothly merged into Park Avenue traffic and they were off.

Sayuri’s was one of Tony and Pepper’s favorite date night spots, and once he was instructed on how to use chopsticks and what proper sushi etiquette was, Loki seemed to enjoy himself. He picked up on things remarkably quickly, and Tony realized partway through that Loki was not only watching them, he was watching everyone else in the place as well, eyes flicking around to take in behavior and jargon and the tiny habits that regular patrons had. As he did, his movements became smoother, his joking back and forth with the chef who’d come to work in front of them grew more and more as though he’d grown up with it. It was freaky and really cool, and Tony wondered if he ought to pay more attention to behavior instead of how different their chemical components were.

Pepper had filled him in on the plan when they were getting ready, but after Loki had tried what seemed like one of everything and made lots of very amused noises over the fact he could have wasabi and not die, Tony leaned on the table and went, “So you tried to kill your girlfriend.”

Pepper’s fingers dug into his arm. “Tony,” she said warningly. “Loki, we’re just concerned—“

Loki set his chopsticks down very slowly. “You brought me out here,” he said, “Under the pretense of friendship—“

“No, look,” Tony said quickly, putting up his hands. He knew that tone of voice very well (Loki used it every time Tony asked him to do something in the lab that Loki didn’t want to do or found insulting based on some arbitrary rules that seemed to change from day to day) and knew that if he didn’t head this off at the pass, it would progress into a full God of Mischief-style temper tantrum, and that would be unpleasant for everyone. “This is what people do when they’re concerned about each other. They do things to make people feel better. That’s what we’re trying to do.”

“So you are _taking pity_ on me—“

“Not quite,” Pepper cut in, glaring at Tony for a moment before leaning on her elbows on the table and using her best CEO voice. “What we are doing is trying to figure out how to help a… a friend, _not_ a prisoner or a lab rat—“ another quick glance at Tony “—who’s obviously got something going on that’s upsetting him.”

“And by association, upsetting the rest of us. I mean, _I_ feel pretty upset.”

“My heart bleeds for you,” Loki muttered.

“Don’t let his prodding fool you,” Pepper said. “Before you and Sif came, the only person Tony really had who could keep up with him was Dr. Banner. We want to keep you around, you’re a challenge.”

“Ye—hey!”

“You’re only protesting because it’s true,” Pepper said mildly. “Loki, you did agree to come out with us of your own free will…”

His eyes had narrowed, but Loki nodded slowly. “True…”

“…and you’ve accepted our hospitality…”

“Are you trying to entrap me in my own rules, Lady?”

Pepper smiled. “I would _never._ ”

“No, never.” Loki sighed. “Very well. No _tantrums._ It would be unseemly.”

“Thank you. I’m glad we can all be adults here.” Pepper’s Fortune 500 smile didn’t fade, but the tension around her eyes relaxed. “Now. Why don’t you tell us what you feel comfortable sharing, and we’ll go from there?”

*

Two hours later, the three of them emerged from the restaurant. Loki was strangely quiet, not really responding to any of Tony’s (admittedly halfhearted) jibes. Everyone was thoughtful.

“Thank you,” Pepper said in the car. Loki had taken shotgun, violating the rules that stated that _he who calls shotgun gets it_ , but Tony hadn’t protested. He’d been too busy thinking.

“I ought to be thanking you for your generosity,” Loki replied carefully. It was a politician’s non-answer to the question not actually asked. “It was not your household, but once the rules are invoked…”

“Yes, I know.” Pepper’s smile was defined by the shift of the dash lights on her face. “If only it was that easy with everyone in the car.”

“I would like to think it wasn’t easy with _me_.”

“It wasn’t.” Pepper met Tony’s eyes in the rearview mirror. “You’re very quiet back there, Mr. Stark.”

“My tummy’s full,” Tony said. “It’s naptime.”

“It’s not even eight yet.”

“Not even eight… so that makes it what, almost five back in California?”

“Yes…” Pepper’s brows drew together. “Why?”

They pulled up in front of the elevators in the garage and Pepper handed the keys off to the parking attendant. Tony climbed out of the backseat.

“Yo, Frosty,” he said, and was rewarded with a tight-lipped glance from Loki. “When’s your bedtime? Will the angry lady with the sword even let you into the room?”

“Probably not. Don’t call me Frosty.”

“You still feel like you can go out, Iceman?”

“Don’t call me _Iceman._ Why?”

“Everyone’s asking me _why_ ,” Tony said. “Nobody’s asking me _what_.”

There was a silence as Loki and Pepper shared a look (and the fact they were on good enough terms to do so really ought to have scared Tony, but he’d had some sake in him with dinner, and was feeling brave). “What is the cause of these questions?” Loki asked slowly, as though speaking to a child.

“I’m thinking you need to relax,” Tony said. “All this… whatever’s really going on with Sif and you has got you tense, and as your buddy, it’s my duty to un-tense you.”

“Tony…” Pepper said quietly, “What are you thinking?”

“I’m thinking I need to tart him up,” Tony said, pointing a lazy finger at Loki, “And trot him out to a bar. But not a bar here. They don’t really like him here unless we’re paying, and I’ve been to all the bars in the city and they make me _bored_. Let’s go to a bar somewhere else. Like California.”

“And how are you going to _get_ to California, Tony?” Pepper’s expression was somewhere between resigned and amused, but it turned into confusion when Tony pointed at Loki again.

“Me?”

“Him,” Tony said with a grin. “I am going to do a ride-along when you do your little poof thing. For science.”

“No.”

“You’re on the couch tonight,” Tony said, holding up a finger, “And all you’d do is tear everything up because you are bored and tense.”

“Are you studying the psychology of the gods now,” Loki asked. Pepper glanced at him, then gave Tony a concerned look which meant that she was worried Loki was going to start blowing up cars if Tony didn’t stop (though in Tony’s defense, that had only been the _one time_ , and he’d done it to test out the durability of some new equipment Jane had wanted to use in pretty harsh conditions, so it had all worked out).

Tony kept going. “Not yet, but that’s on the list. I’ll have to do more reading before I’m prepared to psychoanalyze your thousand years of complexes.” He shrugged. “But if you want to spend the rest of the evening sitting around the tower twiddling your thumbs and not speaking to Sif, instead of experiencing the chaos of a California nightclub on a Saturday night…”

He knew he’d won when a sour look crossed Loki’s face that smoothed immediately into a look of polite interest. “I suppose there are less productive ways to spend my time,” he said. “Very well.”

“Great,” Tony said. “Let’s—“

Loki was suddenly beside him, fingers wrapping tight as a vise around his arm, and then the shadows descended. When they cleared, Tony was blinking in bright sunlight reflecting off the water. It took him a moment to figure out where they were.

“How’d you know how to get to Malibu?” he asked. Loki, who was idly playing notes on the piano – some strange, haunting melody from the planet Zed, probably – looked over. 

“I make it my business to know many things,” he replied.

“That’s not an answer,” Tony said, but he was already moving toward the garage. Loki followed, and Tony watched as he took in everything – the layout of the rooms they went through, the code Tony used to access his workshop. Collecting the keys for his Audi from the lockbox, Tony led the way. 

“Where are we going, Stark?”

“To that car.”

“No. _Where_ are we going?”

Tony thumbed the Unlock button, grinning at the God who was eyeing the small car warily. “Get in, loser,” he said, and experienced a momentary sense of unreality at quoting Mean Girls to an alien. “We’re going _shopping._ ”

*

Four hours and three Rodeo Drive boutiques later, Tony stepped back and eyed Loki critically. “You look like you just walked out of a magazine shoot,” he said at last, flopping onto a plushly upholstered couch. “Not bad.”

“I look _ridiculous._ ” Loki was pulling at the waist of the jeans he was wearing, frowning at the material. “How do mortals _wear_ these?”

“How do you wear full leather in the middle of summer and not die when your baseline body temperature is just above seventy?” Tony shrugged. “Roll the sleeves up to the elbows.” The attendant, who had figured out just who it was he was dressing, gingerly stepped forward and, touching Loki as little as possible, started rolling the sleeves of the dark green buttoned shirt. He visibly shook when the God turned and grinned with all eighty of his teeth and Tony swatted Loki’s arm with the lid of a shoebox. “Stop scaring the nice man.”

“It’s hardly my fault he is weak.”

“Don’t pay attention to Grumpy,” Tony said to the attendant. “He’s got lady troubles.”

“Ah,” the attendant said, moving to Loki’s other side and starting on that sleeve with a little more confidence. “I guess it happens to everyone. My girlfriend’s a great woman, but sometimes she just gets mad, and I don’t _get it_.”

“Sadly, he knows exactly why his girlfriend’s mad,” Tony said. “And it’s his fault.”

“I would much rather my personal life not be spread about,” Loki said, the hint of a growl in his voice.

“And I’d rather the alien demigods living in my tower not destroy the furniture when their cohabitating, impossibly oversexed bliss is interrupted.” Tony brandished a belt at Loki, continuing in a sing-song voice. “But _ya can’t always get watcha wa-ant…_ ”

“My advice?” The attendant said, then blanched a little as he stepped back and made some minor adjustments to how the shirt fit over Loki’s torso. “If I can say so, sir—“

“Since you’ve already begun,” Loki said with a sigh, gesturing with a hand. It was a very regal gesture. 

“…yeah. Um. Just give in.”

“I don’t think you know how his girlfriend works,” Tony said. “She’s scary.”

Loki nodded solemnly. “Terrifying. Deadly. Beautiful.”

“Sexy,” Tony added. Loki glared at him.

“Giving in to her would make her more suspicious.”

“Well, then… maybe _not_ give in. But figure out why she wants what she wants.” The man shrugged. “Lots of guys don’t think about that and just assume that by giving in they’re going to make her… or him, happy. But that’s kind of shallow. People don’t like shallow.”

“She is not a shallow lady,” Loki said pensively. “Not in the least.”

“And uh, I don’t know you very well, or at all,” the man continued. “But you don’t seem like a shallow guy either, sir.”

“He’s not. He’s like an onion.” Tony wished he had a recording device right now so he could record all of this and put it on YouTube. _Prickly God of Mischief Gets Relationship Advice From Tom Ford Employee._ It’d be huge.

“So what you are saying,” Loki said, ignoring Tony completely, “Is that rather than simply try to appease her in an attempt to repair our relationship, I ought to discern the root cause of her ire with me and respond accordingly.”

“Um. Yes.”

Loki stared at the attendant for so long that Tony could all but see the sweat beading up on the man’s forehead. Then at last, he said, “What an astute observation. I thought your species was destined only for mediocrity.”

The attendant and Tony exchanged quizzical looks, and Tony shrugged. “I have no idea,” Tony stage-whispered. “He doesn’t do compliments.”

“Of course,” Loki continued as though half to himself, “Given the varieties of idiocy in the gene pool, I doubt that true intelligence can gain any kind of permanent foothold. A pity.”

“And there we go,” Tony said, organizing the various boxes and garment bags they’d collected on their trip through the menswear boutiques on the drive. “Better get out of here before he starts talking about genetic predispositions toward gullibility and submission. Besides, we’ve got a schedule to keep.”

*

They hit the bars around midnight, rolling up to the first in Tony’s Audi and heading in past the long line of sequined, dressed-up men and women waiting to get in and stewing in their clouds of expensive cologne. Loki got more than a few looks from patrons as they passed the private tables in the lounge, but even _Tony_ was looking. _Damn,_ he thought. _I did good._

He couldn’t even blame himself. In dark indigo jeans cut close to his body and the dark green buttoned shirt, his hair almost blue-black in the dim light, Loki presented a very attractive target. He didn’t help matters either, leaning against the bar on an elbow and smiling at the bartender when he ordered his drink, flirting shamelessly with her when she returned with it.

“Aren’t you worried Sif will stick a knife in you for looking at other women?” Tony asked when his own drink arrived (with much less attention paid to him, he noticed). Loki sipped his own, eyeing the dim and humid dance floor already covered in writhing, sweaty bodies.

“She knows I look,” the God-alien answered, shrugging. “It is simply our way. She also knows – or she should, anyway – that my eyes always turn back to her.”

“You sure that knowledge isn’t in question right now?” Loki didn’t respond, but Tony saw his eyelashes flicker a little. Uncertainty wasn’t something Tony was used to seeing on his favorite lab rat. “Sif was pretty mad earlier.”

“She was wrathful,” Loki said. “Yet…”

“What did she want, anyway? Why’s she so upset?” Seeing that Loki’s face had gone carefully blank, Tony shrugged. “I’m going to find out one way or the other. Might as well tell me now so that I can drink to forget.”

Loki told him – the brief version anyway – and when he’d finished, Tony stared at him for a minute and then signaled the bartender over. “We’re going to need more alcohol,” he said. “A lot more. Like just give us the whole bottle of whiskey.”

“Bad night?” she asked, pouring them both another round. Loki got his first and raised his glass to the bartender – her nametag said _Andrea_.

“If you keep attending to us,” he said, “I’m certain it will turn round.” The smile he wore didn’t reach his eyes, but Andrea didn’t see it, and smiled back with a blush visible even in the darkness.

“Sure thing,” she said. When she went off to take more orders, Tony ran his hands through his hair.

“A lot more alcohol,” he muttered.

They found out, later that night, that there was in fact a point where Midgard drinks started affecting Jotun physiology. And then they passed that point (for science, of course) and kept going.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Alföðr_ : Allfather; Odin.
> 
> _konungur_ : king.
> 
> _rut og bera helvítið börn og skrímsli_ : "rut and carry the bastard children of a monster
> 
> _Þú aðgát aldrei fyrir hvers hagsmunum en þína eigin_ : "You never cared for any interests but your own"
> 
> _Það var ekki góður_ : "that was not kind"
> 
> _Einn hundur með tveimur herrum,_ : "the dog has two masters"
> 
> _fyrir Sif er nálægt tíma sínum Loki, og hún hefur gert val hennar til að taka þig sem maka og ég er_ ánægð, _en þú verður að hlusta á hana og ekki segja henni svo._ : "for Sif is close to her time, Loki, and she has made her choice to take you as a mate and I am _glad_ , but you must listen to her and not dismiss her so"
> 
> _Hún talar um geðveiki sjálfi_ : "she speaks of madness herself"
> 
> _barn á svikari_ : " the child of a traitor"
> 
> _Ertu viss um að þú gætir jafnvel elska barn á öllum?_ : "are you certain you could even love a child at all"
> 
> _hollusta_ : "loyalty"
> 
> _æra_ : "honor"
> 
> _elska_ : "love"
> 
> _Alveg vitlaus_ : "completely mad"


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> takes place before and then after loki's stint with pepper and tony, since we decided to do this chapter and the previous in a slightly non-linear format

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> to make up for taking like way too long to write this here's 5900 words of girl-bonding and weird alien mating emotions and also tony stark

“ _Chattel_ —”

The _shhink_ of metal cuts through the training room air, and Sif spins the blade in her hand, slashing at an imaginary enemy (but not so imaginary that she can't see his glimmering hound-teeth and cat-slit eyes at the end of her sword).

“ _Hundur_ —”

Sweat drips down her back like mercury, flickering in her eyes, stinging them red with images of dark hair and sharpened teeth. Her muscles burn as she turn on her heels, digging her boots into the hard floor.

“ _Barn á svikari_ —”

Sif slips a dagger from the small of her back, flinging it at the wall with deadly precision, its blade buried to the hilt into the metal where she had imagined Loki's heart to be. Cracks snake onto the surface like veins, dripping down the wall like blood. The warrior's blade cuts through the air, slashing, swinging and Sif is just so _tired_ —

“ _Ertu viss um að þú gætir jafnvel elska barn á öllum_?”

She falls to her knees, sweat mercury and slick down her back, and leans onto her sword, the blade wedged into the floor.

“If you despise the decorating that much, all you have to do is say so.”

Sif lifts her head, Pepper's scent reaching her before she turns her head to meet the redhead's gaze. Her clothes are pressed and her hair is curled soft around her shoulders, her eyes gentle and for a moment, Sif wishes she could be at such peace.

(There is no peace in the Heat, when her body burns and her mouth waters for the salt of flesh beneath her fingers.)

“Far from the decorating,” the warrior replies, wrenching the blade from the cracked steel floor and slipping it back inside the scabbard at her hip. Her hair hangs in clumps and streaks down her face, sticking to her skin. Pepper's arms are folded gently over her chest and she _knows_ , Sif can feel it in the sweat of her palms and the heaviness of her armor on her shoulders.

 _There is no more time for secrets_ , she thinks, and the fire in her belly flickers, dormant for now but not for long.

“If you don't want to talk about it, that's fine,” the CEO says, leaning against the doorframe. “But something tells me putting holes in the walls and the floor isn't doing all that much for you.”

Sif's scoff is all the answer she needs, and Pepper watches the warrior yank her last knife from the steel wall.

“How about we get you out of that armor and out of the tower?” the redhead suggests, eyeing the foot-long crack in the metal paneling.

“You would do that for me?” Sif asks, running her fingers through her damp hair and pulling it from her face. “I am not in the best of temperaments, as I am sure the Avengers have made quite clear.” Her gaze drops in embarrassment, but Pepper pays it no mind.

“I've worked for Tony stark for nearly a decade,” the CEO states. “I don't think there's anything you could tell me or do in front of me or a camera that would faze me.”

At her words Sif laughs, the first real flicker of happiness she's felt all day, and she makes her way towards Pepper when she catches another scent on her tongue, like gunpowder and leather and the dripping tang of sex.

“I bet Clint and I could find something that would skeeve you out,” Natasha's voice slithers in from the hall, her socked feet silent on the metal floor. Sif notices her hair is a mess, wild and curved around her jaw, and she can see the faint outline of a kiss-mark on the slope of her shoulder.

“Tony has done far worse than walk into a room smelling of sex,” the CEO drawls, and Sif can't help but giggle, the easy camaraderie of the women taking her mind off her no-doubt brooding, temperamental other half.

“Well I didn't want to be the first to point it out,” the warrior trails off, and Natasha only snickers.

“A little bird told me about someone needing to get out of the tower and go out on the town,” the assassin begins.

“ _Little_?” Pepper injects.

“Alright, with those heels I guess that's not quite fair,” Natasha says, noticing the way Sif's chin tilts down at her words, and the assassin remembers the feral strength of the warrior's body, the sharp ring of her dagger sliding across the floor.

“I'll cut to the chase,” she says, meeting Sif's hesitant gaze. “That whole stint this morning was a little terrifying, especially since we couldn't understand either of you most of the time, and as much as he probably deserved it, I don't think you would have been too happy with the team if we had just let you rip Loki limb from limb, even though we've wanted to do it before ourselves.” The assassin spreads her arms in a shrug, her body language purposefully relaxed. “You don't have to tell us what it was about, but you obviously need to do something other than continue to stew in your pot of rage here.”

“Get cleaned up, put on your favorite earth clothes, and meet us in the common room,” Pepper continues, patting Sif on the shoulder before turning to go. “We're going out.”

“Where?” Sif calls after the CEO and the assassin.

“That's for us to know and you to be surprised,” Natasha says, turning round the doorway with a wink.

Sif looks down at the daggers in her hands, and she smiles.

 

 

“Pepper, look! It's like slicing through butter.”

“Tony, for your own safety I hope you asked before you borrowed those.”

“Of course I did. After today, even I know the dangers of pissed off alien space god vikings.”

Pepper sighs, watching Tony examine a trio of Sif's very sharp and very dangerous daggers. He takes one in hand and begins slicing a thick tube of shining metal, the blade slipping through it as if the metal were melting in his hands. Out of the billionaire's line of sight, Natasha silently picks up one of the daggers, turning it over in her hands, tilting the point down towards the countertop.

“This is solid tungsten carbide,” Tony explains, fanning out the pieces of metal like cheese on a cracker plate. “The only thing on earth that can even begin to scratch this stuff is boron nitride or a diamond,” he continues, spreading his arms in sinister scientific excitement. “And I just cut it into bite-size servings with a _space knife_.”

Pepper shakes her head, reminding herself that his love of science is one of the things she does actually love about the brunet as she hears the _tip-tap_ of Sif's shoes coming down the stairs.

“Where did you _get_ these?” Stark calls to the warrior, holding up one of her knives. “Is this some uru-forged-in-the-heart-of-a-dying-star shit like Thor has?”

“If I told you, it would take away the fun of your scientific discovery, would it not?” Sif remarks, a sly grin on her face as she and Natasha follow Pepper out to her car.

Tony sets the dagger down and piles the slices of tungsten into a bowl to take back to the lab, but a small glimmer of scratches on the granite catches his eye and the billionaire isn't sure whether to scream or sigh.

“A dick? Really? Is Romanova _twelve_?”

 

 

“How?”

“What? They're shoes.”

“I can see that, but _why_?”

Sif stares at the sky-high platform heels in the store window, wooden and jagged and her head tilts in curiosity like a cat's. Little heels are nothing strange to the warrior, though these certainly are. (She prefers the soft leather and metal of her favorite boots, but alas, the court does not.)

“There are a lot of things you're gonna learn about Earth,” Natasha quips, adjusting her sunglasses and popping her gum. “The mortal fascination with 'because we can' is one of them.”

“We can always go in and you can try them on,” Pepper suggests, her loose hair fluttering in the breeze that cuts through New York's concrete jungle. “Think of it as a challenge.”

“You certainly know how to win a woman over, Lady Pepper,” Sif says as she follows the two females into the shop.

“You should see what I can do with Tony.”

 

 

“Do you think Clint would like this?” Natasha calls from a maze of thick sweaters, the redhead too short to be visible over the racks. All Sif can see is a cream-colored turtleneck, the fabric embellished with weaving patterns that twist like Yggdrasill's Branches. She wonders what Loki would look like in such a thing, the soft fabric thick and form-fitting over his smooth skin, and her mouth waters.

(She's still furious with him, oh what she wouldn't _give_ for one of her bites to have ripped through his skin, but the thought of him beneath her fingers is honey down her throat and she waits for the evening, waits to see his cat-eyes and hound-teeth aimed at her again.)

“I thought this was a day for us,” the warrior grins, running her hands along a shimmering silver dress, plucking it from the rack and turning toward the changing rooms. 

“I'm looking for things that I'll enjoy ripping off of Clint in front of a fireplace while there's a blizzard raging outside and candles for mood-lighting. Then I'll steal it later and wear it myself.”

“Don't forget the champagne,” Pepper interjects, stepping out around a large shelf of scarves.

“To each their own.”

Sif laughs, ducking into a changing room and slipping off her clothes. The dress is slick against her skin, sleek and silver and shimmering. She glides her fingers through her hair, tossing it over her shoulder and giving her reflection a once-over.

With clothes like this, how bad could Miðgarðr really be?

 

 

“Cough it up.”

“I don't believe this.”

“Show me the Bens, Potts.”

The CEO pulls a bill from her wallet, slapping it into Natasha's palm with a sigh, the assassin cackling to herself behind her sunglasses as she pockets the money.

“Better luck next time, Lady Pepper,” Sif grins, holding a handful of brightly-colored bottles and scanning the shelves for more that catch her eye. “I paint my face for the court and festivals, but my hands normally wade in too many weapons for anything else to be practical.”

The warrior holds a bottle of glimmering gold polish up to the light, watching as the flecks prickle like stars.  
“Until now,” she finishes, and Pepper only huffs, turning to a display case of blushes and tints. Natasha joins Sif at the nail polishes, picking through the different colors, following the warrior and answering her questions.

“You're like a kid in a fucking candy store and it's stupid cute,” the redhead says, watching Sif pick up what looks like a curious-looking pair of scissors. She opens and closes them, her head tilted like a cat's.

“What are these?”

“Eyelash curlers.” The warrior raises her brows, holding the curlers up to her eye before bringing them down and giving them a reproachful stare, as if they were one of Miðgarðr's dreadful little centipedes crawling over her armor.

“Again, I am forced to beg the question: _why_?”

“What did I say about 'because we can'?”

“Just because we _can_ doesn't mean we _should_ ,” Pepper interjects, a collection of eyeshadow boxes tucked into a bag under her arm.

“Funsucker,” Natasha teases. “Come on Sif, let's put you in the makeover chair.”

“As if you even need to ask.”

 

 

“I need to go out with you more often,” Natasha quips, taking a huge sip of her soda as the three women sit at their high-top table outside, surrounded by burgers and fries and peanuts and too many shopping bags to count.

“I'll have to admit, I never pegged you as the moderately-fast-food type,” Pepper adds, her sleeves pulled up as she takes a bite of her burger, licking the mayonnaise from her lips.

“I didn't either,” Sif laughs, trying to keep all of the toppings on her burger in one place. “But I make it a point to try new things before I make any assumptions, unlike someone I know.” The warrior's smile turns sour, and Pepper meets Natasha's eyes over a bag of fries, her brow raised.

“Am I correct in assuming I know who that someone is?” Pepper begins, wading gently into waters she's hardly tested (and feeling she may have to do the same later on with Loki himself if Tony has his way).

“Unfortunately yes,” Sif replies, brushing her hair behind her ear where the thick of her coat and scarf have curled it into her face.

“What we said before still stands,” the assassin pipes up, both her hands curled protectively around her jumbo soda. “You don't have to tell us if you don't want to, but we're here if you decide you want to let it all out instead of ripping the training rooms a couple of new ones.” The smile on Sif's face is music to Natasha's ears amidst the bustle of downtown New York, and she hooks the heels of her boots around the metal of her chair, leaning forward to listen.

Sif stares down at her nearly-gone burger, feeling the cold October wind flicker through her hair. She knows she can't hide forever, and she's already trusted Dr. Banner enough to tell him. If anything, her time with Natasha and Pepper has strengthened her trust in the entire team even more, knowing they wouldn't surround themselves with anything less than as good as themselves. _Best to do it now and get it out, rather than let it sit on my shoulders heavier than armor and weigh me down._

“Much of this may be very strange to you,” she begins with a hesitant smile, “though the Doctor seemed to handle it well, so I doubt you'll have much trouble.”

“What did I tell you about working for Tony Stark?” Pepper raises a brow, her hand on her chin.

“I second that,” Natasha says around a mouthful of peanuts. Sif takes a bite of her burger and a deep breath for good measure.

“Are either of you familiar with the concept of heat?”

 

 

“Oh please, that's the least weird thing I've ever heard in my life,” Natasha says, adjusting her sunglasses as Sif finishes her explanation. “There's nothing to be ashamed of, Sif. That's your body and who you are.”

“You should hear how it works for women on Earth,” Pepper adds. “You don't know weird until you've bled angrily from your catbox for a week.”

The last of Sif's burger hovers at her mouth, the warrior dumbfounded at her words. _Blood? Catbox? Midgardian slang continues to elude me. I suppose I shouldn't laugh at Thor's misunderstandings anymore_ , Sif thinks, her brows knit in confusion at the CEO's jargon. 

“ _Blood_?”

“Don't worry, I'm sure Tony has a biology textbook stored on some server in the tower, but something tells me that's not quite how he learned anyway,” the assassin cackles as Pepper aims a teasing, slow-motion fist at her cheek. “Wait till we take you to the feminine hygiene aisle of a drugstore.”

“The point we're trying to make here is that there's nothing to be ashamed of,” the CEO continues. “No one on the team is going to think any less of you for something that is completely normal and natural for you and your body.”

“Dr. Banner said the same thing, but I guess it took a little more prodding to get me to believe it,” Sif admits with a shy smile.

“So if we have this right, the problem here is convincing Loki that being your baby-daddy is in fact not terrifying and horrid, and that you honestly don't give a shit what anyone else is going to think,” Natasha muses.

“ _Baby-daddy_? _Really_?”

“It's the first thing I thought of.”

“He is selfish in this way,” Sif begins. “He believes that if he were to sire a child, it would grow up under the shame of having him as a father, and his fears of his own childhood and recent years cast doubt on his ability to care for anything, sometimes even himself.”

“And I am unsure how to rid him of this belief, and myself of the very real possibility that he may be correct,” the warrior admits, and Pepper can see in her eyes worry and disbelief and the sleepless nights she has spent thinking and hoping and praying that just this once, she doesn't have to be right.

“What does Loki mean to you, Sif?” the CEO asks gently, though she believes she already knows the answer.

“Everything,” Sif answers without even thinking. “I am the Swordhand to his Silvertongue, and where he challenges me I keep him grounded. We are alike in the ways others have spit upon us for our paths and it has always been a source of bonding for us, to see in each other what no one else has. As a child I put a dagger into his hand and told him to cut my hair for all of Ásgarðr to see, and when the court whispered behind my back he guarded it with his life.”

“We have never been nothing to each other, so much so that now we are everything.”

“What would a child mean to you?”

Sif is silent for a few moments, letting the cold breeze carry her thoughts as it does the ends of her hair.

“Because Ásgarðr is a realm of war, the mating drive ensures our survival even in our most depleted numbers,” Sif begins, her thoughts coming faster than her mouth can speak the words to voice them. “But it has long been seen as much more than that; there is an instinct shared amongst all beings to propagate themselves, to pass on what they have learned to those who will come after and to continue the cycle. And to us such a thing is only natural, for from the Great _Móðir_ all things come, and to her all things return at their end, the Allthing unending. In the Heat there is hardly thought, only instinct and Creation, the highest act that can be offered in Yggdrasill's honor.”

“Children are not only for happiness or lineage,” the warrior states, her eyes burning. “They are the Great _Móðir_ 's gift if one desires them to be, the manifestation of our own power to give life as she has given so to us.”

“To beget life is to honor not only her, but each other,” Sif finishes, and her companions are silent, the only movement the city surrounding them.

“Something tells me you already have it all figured out,” Pepper replies softly, a gentle smile spread across her face. Natasha's head rests on her folded arms, enraptured at Sif's words.

“But how am I to convince Loki?” the warrior questions, head tilted curiously. “He does not believe he is capable of the love that is necessary to raise a child, nor that I would give no thought to the whispers behind my back that I am mother to a traitor's son.”

“Tony Stark is a man whose entire fortune was made on the back of the business of killing,” Pepper states. “He went through money on casinos and women and booze and drugs like a kid in a candy store. He prided himself and his company on how convenient and simple his weapons made it to level a city to the ground.”

“Then everything changed after Afghanistan,” the CEO continues. “Weapons weren't about killcounts and flashy expos anymore; it was about protecting people who use your fears and loves against you, and helping those who can't do it for themselves.”

“Before Clint, all I knew was the Red Room and the feel of someone beneath me as their life bled out of their skin onto their own bed,” Natasha adds. “And even as SHIELD agents, we still lie and cheat and kill to stay alive and keep others alive; now we're just on the other side of the fence.”

“All of us have done things we aren't proud of, and all of us know that the darkness doesn't ever really go away,” Natasha continues. 

“You can't wipe out all your red, but it doesn't have to be the only thing in there.”

 

 

Sif paces her and Loki's shared complex of rooms in Avengers Tower, dragging a blanket in one hand and a dagger in the other. Her bare feet flicker through the thick, fluffy carpet, her leggings warm and a newly-bought sweater sitting large over her shoulders. She picked it for its soft cream color and the patterns of tiny stags leaping over the fabric. Their horns remind her of Loki's own helm, curved and glittering gold and powerful.

_You can't wipe out all your red, but it doesn't have to be the only thing in there._

The assassin's words stick in her head like honey as she walks, the cold autumn air through the window ruffling her loose hair.

_What would a child mean to you?_

A pang of hunger cuts through the warrior's belly, even though she had eaten only hours ago. Tossing the dagger onto their bed, she makes her way down to the kitchen, not realizing that she's carried the blanket down until she stops in front of the refrigerator and only one of her hands is free to open the door.

“You look like Tasha after a workout,” Clint's voice hovers around the corner as he walks into the common area, dressed down in loose clothes that Sif remembers from his training rooms. She tilts her head in curiosity as she pulls a package from the refrigerator (making sure it's the one labeled _Alien-Space-God-Vikings_ in Tony's unruly scratch), sitting at the counter.

“In pyjamas, carrying around a blanket, eating everything in sight; you could be the same person, really,” the archer explains, plucking an orange from a bowl of fruit while Sif giggles.

“Also, I have to ask, and you don't have to ask if you don't want to but I'm just really curious: what is that head-tilt thing?” Clint asks, taking a seat opposite her and picking apart his orange. “I feel like I'm talking to a cat, except it's a cat that's almost six feet tall and could castrate me with a single hand.”

“ _Aaand_ one that eats raw steak and turkey for lunch,” he observes, leaning his head in to see into her bowl. “I don't know if I'll ever get used to that. I'm sorry, I don't shut up, would you like to say something?”

Sif laughs, which isn't very easy with her mouth full of raw meat, so it comes out as _hrgmnrgsmrhgr_ instead and she growls. (She would wave her bloody hands in frustration but she remembers that raw meat could kill her human companions and that would be undesirable, so she doesn't.)

“Maybe I should have waited to say that.”

Sif answers with a huff.

“You're making the Loki face,” Clint says, and Sif narrows her eyes, confused.

“The Loki face?”

“Yeah you furrow your brow and purse your lips and sort of suck in your cheeks and then your cheekbones just start glimmering in the light,” the archer demonstrates, exaggerating, and Sif bursts into a fit of cackles.

“I knew I could get you to laugh,” Clint says, popping the last of his orange slices into his mouth. “After what happened this morning, anyone would need it.”

“I cannot say I am proud of the way both of us acted,” the warrior replies, taking her empty bowl to the sink and washing it and her hands. “You should not have had to bear witness to such a thing, let alone restrain us.” The warrior runs a nervous hand through her hair as she returns to the counter, standing before the archer. “For that I am sorry.”

“Don't bother apologizing,” Clint waves away her worries with a lazy hand. “I'm not good at that kind of thing anyway. What's done is done.”

“Are you sure?” Sif asks.

“Completely,” he assures her. “The important thing now is getting you and your weird snarly boy-toy back into whatever weird alien groove you're normally on.”

“Is there anything you need right now?” the archer asks, grabbing an apple and leaning forward into the counter, meeting the warrior's eyes. She thinks back to her rather violent outburst in the training rooms, and smiles.

“I want to shoot something.” Clint's eyes light up and he offers Sif his arm.

“Oh baby, you just said the magic words.”

 

 

Sif kneels on the roof of the tower, the cold winds of the late night whipping around the penthouse and ripping through her hair. She bows in honor to the Great _Móðir_ , Yggdrasill's glittering Branches splintering unseen like cracks across the sky, the New York skyline too bright to see them. She shivers, feeling her skin prickle beneath her soft sweater, the icy rush burning through her bones.

“Somehow I knew I would find you here.”

Loki's voice drips honey-dark down her spine as she sits up, and the wind carries his scent to her, heavy and heady and soft like fir trees in winter. He reeks of alcohol and Stark and expensive cologne.

“I can smell where you've been,” she states, keeping her eyes trained on the stars, towards Ásgarðr, towards Yggdrasill.

“As I you,” he counters and she can hear the change in his breath, and she imagines his mouth open ever-so, breath drawn dark over his teeth as he tastes every scent that clings to her skin.

“You've been with the archer.”

“We shot targets,” the warrior shoots back, teeth laced with spines. “He has eyes only for Romanova.” Loki reeks of nervous fear and it jars her senses, making her curl her lip in frustration.

“Are you _afbrúðigr_?” she asks incredulously, turning her head around to face the sleek, dark-haired sorcerer, and she can hear the huff of his breath that tells her everything she already knows. Heat bubbles in her belly when her eyes meet his, and the sharp leather curved around his shoulders almost beckons for the pinpricks of her fingernails. “You cannot hide it from me, Loki. There is nothing we can keep hidden now.”

The God of Mischief growls, whipping his head around to face the skyline, and Sif knows she's hit a nerve.

“We cannot dance around this fire any longer,” the warrior states.

“And you cannot ask me to do this.”

“Why not?” Sif demands to know, leaping to her feet and stalking towards the raven-haired God. “Because you think you are incapable of showing kindness to another? Because you think I care what the dogs of the court will whimper behind my back?”

“You want the child of a traitor and a monster and I cannot allow you to degrade yourself in such a manner,” Loki hisses, the sharp edges of his canines glinting in the New York light and Sif has to restrain herself from shoving him to the ground and slipping her tongue between them.

“Why do you believe that I care so much about what others will think?” she snaps, the wind whipping through her hair and the hair on the back of her neck standing on edge from more than just the cold. “My honor is mine and mine alone, and I decide what it is, not you or anyone else.” Sif's eyes are blown dark and wide in the night air, and she can see the Branches of Yggdrasill cracking through Loki's own, can feel the waves of uncertainty flickering from his body like the sea upon the shore.

The God of Mischief cannot lie to her, yet another stipulation of his release to earth, and she can feel the desire to do so in his bones as she takes his hand, the need to hide the hurricane of fire and silence that lingers in him and yearns for her.

“You cannot wipe out all of the red,” she echoes Natasha's words earlier, knowing their weight upon Loki's own shoulders. “But it does not have to be the only thing that you keep.”

“I know that the darkness will never truly leave you, and there is nothing wrong with that,” the warrior says, the breeze flickering the ends of Loki's half-tied hair and stirring the curls and braids that frame his face. “I am the Swordhand to your Silvertongue, I am your shore as you are my sea; where I am steady you challenge me, and where you are unsure I am safe.”

“If you are truly opposed to a child I will desist,” Sif says quietly, bringing the God of Mischief's hand to her cheek. “But it has never been only for myself.”

“There is nothing I could give to a child that would not do it harm.” Loki states, though Sif can feel it half-hearted and slippery on his tongue, and she keeps steady with her words.

“When I gave you my knife to cut my hair for all of Ásgarðr to see, you guarded my back from the whispers of the court with your life,” she reminds the Trickster. “And you have done so since we were young, and even now. You cannot tell me there is no room for kindness in your heart when you have already shown this much.”

“You have many lessons to give, if not more than I. We are all liars and killers in the things we have done and the things we will do again, in the wars we have rallied and the causes we have set upon our shoulders. Ásgarðr is a realm drifting in a river of War and Blood, and still does the Great _Móðir_ keep us in her hold,” Sif continues. “There is nothing you can do that will keep you from her Branches when the worlds end.”

The God of Mischief pulls the warrior close, pressing a kiss to her wild, wind-whipped hair as she digs her fingers into his well-worn leathers and soft greens, praying to Yggdrasill that _something_ she has said on the rooftop has made its way past the knitted thorns in Loki's mind.

“There is no guarantee that I will be a suitable father,” Loki says, and Sif rolls her eyes at his continued tirade of protests, burying a smile in his shoulder at _I will_ instead of _I would_.

“And there is no guarantee that you'll be a bad one,” she retorts. “I remember little of my mother and that does not doom me to failure.” She reaches up and curls a hand through his hair, fingering the curls and waves as they flicker in the breeze. “We are our children's parents; we do not have to be our own.” The God of Mischief jerks away from her hold, meeting her eyes with furrowed brows and and the rush of fear-scent that hits Sif's nose is like a shield-blow.

“Child _ren_?”

“Yeah really, I know you're both on some kind of weird alien pheromone reproductive high right now, but _babies_? In my tower?”

“ _Tíkarsonur_ ,” Loki hisses, yanking Sif close in an instinctual protective display, seething at Stark's armored appearance on the roof. “Aren't you supposed to be in a drunken stupor and whimpering like a dog somewhere?”

“Oh my God, why are you yelling at me for being on the roof of my _own tower_?” the billionaire exclaims, throwing his hands up in futility. “So I take a suit out and do some laps around the city at two in the morning to clear my head from our insane bar crawl, what's it's to you, space viking?” Loki only hisses, and with the way he holds Sif and stares daggers in the brunet, Tony is almost ready to jettison his way out just to stay alive.

“At least you two aren't trying to murder each other again, although if you're still working on that I have to thank you for picking the very solid rooftop instead of the carpet you may or may not have destroyed.”

“Get. Out.”

“ _Sushh_ , Loki,” Sif chides, trying to ignore the comforting feeling of Loki's protectively taut form against her, but the whirring of Stark's armor cuts her short.

“Fine fine fine, do your weird alien viking mating dance on my roof, but I don't want to hear another word about babies until I've had at least another bottle of wine and some time alone with my notes.”

“Notes?” Sif questions.

“You're from Ásgarðr, he's from Jötunheimr,” the billionaire motions to each with his hands. “If you two need _help_ , you probably won't want to hear it and I don't want to be sober if I have to tell you!” he yells, propelling himself into the New York landscape.

Loki and Sif watch him disappear into the glittering city lights, the God of Mischief pawing at the warrior's hips and burying her face into his neck with his hand. Sif digs her nails into the leather over his shoulders, nuzzling the slant of his jaw with her cheek, letting her scent of sweat and heat mingle with his own, the instinct to claim him as her own in every way she can tingling in her toes and sliding down her neck, finally allowed its reign in her belly.

“Why don't we go inside,” she suggests, taking his hand from her hip and dragging him towards the very warm and very empty penthouse. “You may be able to withstand such cold, but I much prefer warmth.”

“Are you sure this is what you desire, Sif?” the God of Mischief asks, stopping the warrior's hand on the door, and she can see the last glimmer of uncertainty in his eyes.

“It is if you desire it as well, Loki,” Sif says soothingly. “We have never been nothing to each other, and I will not do anything that you do not want equally as well.”

“The darkness will never be gone,” Loki stresses. “There are already days where even you are almost not enough to keep it away. It will not be easy.”

“Nothing that concerns us is ever easy,” Sif quips, a sly smile on her face.

“I can think of a few things that are,” Loki purrs against her neck, pressing into her eager, willing form, and opening the door behind her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> yeah they went to five guys (and sif probably ate an entire sack of the peanuts), sue me those burgers are gREAT
> 
> it's perfectly reasonable to assume that sif hasn't yet sat down with a human bio textbook yet and so she has no idea of the horrible affliction known as the menstrual cycle, and anyone who says different is selling something
> 
>  _afbrúðigr_ \- icelandic for 'jealous'
> 
>  _tíkarsonur_ \- icelandic for 'son of a bitch'. you know i didn't think i'd find it either
> 
>  _sushh_ \- an icelandic variation on 'shh' or 'hush', taken from an icelandic lion king II translation, so you know it's for real
> 
> i really wanted to write out some of clint and sif hanging out and shooting stuff and being bros, but this thing is already long enough as it is and i didn't want to delay posting any further, so it'll have to wait for another time. feel free to imagine any scenarios you like, but if it gets written at a later date it will contain copious amounts of pizza rolls and clint and natasha's very real swank assassin sex nest
> 
> with the huge emotions of out of the way, more silly-gone-serious weird science to come


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> in which tony feels personally victimized by courting aliens.

The morning sun filtered through windows still tinted dark for sleep, and the glow was what finally woke Sif. She stretched luxuriously under the blankets, and felt the arm wrapped around her shift too, fingers tightening against her side. Sif opened her eyes and saw Loki’s were already open, watching her.

They did not speak; they did not have to. Sif reached up and stroked his cheek with her fingertips, and the touch sent a thrill of pleasure through her. Now that she did not have to keep it damped down the heat filled her, slid down her spine and fit into the spaces between her ribs. She stretched up to kiss Loki and twin fireworks went off behind her eyes, a flood of sensations. She could pick out different flavors now with her enhanced senses, and lingered over the kiss for a long moment. When she could taste herself on his tongue she pulled away.

“So,” Loki murmured, pressing his face forward against her throat. His tongue slid over the soft skin. “You are still certain?”

“I would not be here if I were uncertain.” Sif pressed her cheek to his hair, fingers kneading against his scalp. She buried her nose in the dark strands, and felt him sigh at the contact. Last night had not just been sex and the release of their pent-up frustration; she had marked him well, could smell herself up on his skin now. It was his body’s way of signaling to others that he was decidedly _not_ available, and she knew that it would be the same with her. Though honestly, the only one who would be sensitive to such things was Thor, and he was _not_ interested.

Still, it pleased her to tell that Loki was so marked, and she pushed her face into his shoulder and inhaled deeply, taking in lungfuls of his particular scent ( _ozone, pine, moonlight on snow_ ) and by the way he lay quietly against her, fingers stroking circles over her back, Sif knew he was doing the same.

“We should rise,” Loki said at last, though he did not move from her arms or lift his head from her throat. “You are hungry.”

As if he had known – and perhaps he had, Sif had never gone this deep into the effects of the heat before – her stomach rumbled. She dislodged Loki and sat up, running a hand through sleep-mussed hair. “Do you suppose we should warn Stark of…?”

“Oh, no,” Loki said. He sat up, groaned, and pressed his fingertips to his forehead. “Though if he manages to rid me of this pain in my skull, I may be persuaded to tell him we will be needing quite a lot more food.”

“If you had not been an idiot last night, you would not be in this position,” Sif told him, but she reached out, tracing the curve of his ribs with her hand, then sliding her palm over his stomach, just to feel the muscles shift under it. “But that is done, and you are with me now.”

A strange, unfamiliar expression passed over Loki’s face at that, and he caught her wandering hand with his own. “I am,” he said quietly.

They managed to separate themselves and dress, though it was a rather more lengthy process than usual. Sif knew her body was flooding with hormones now, preparing her for the week where they would be in thrall of the heat. She felt more powerful, and Loki seemed to respond to it with great enthusiasm, for he could barely keep his hands off her. Not that she minded.

When they were at last ready, Loki put his hand on her back. “Are you ready?”

“To explain what is about to happen here?” Sif thought about the way that Pepper and Natasha had accepted the explanation without batting an eye, about how Clint had shrugged it off as _definitely not the weirdest thing I’ve seen, Sif_ and then proceeded to fire three arrows at once, all of which struck the bull’s-eye of the target. She smiled a little. “I think at this point all know, and we’ve little to worry about save for the details.”

Loki’s eyebrows shot up as they walked toward the elevators. “ _All know?_ ”

“News seems to travel quickly in this place. _Ssushh,_ Loki. If they have not beaten down our door telling us to leave by now, I think they will not simply because of, well…”

“One hopes,” he muttered, but there was a tilt to the corner of his mouth once more, and Sif relaxed as he stroked her hair. She would have to get used to the increased contact in front of others, for until now their affections had been private things, implied to others but offered in private.

_Many things are about to change_ , she thought, and smiled again. _For the better._

*

“Drink it, Tony.”

“ _No._ ”

“It’ll make your head feel better.”

“I said _no._ I am not your guinea pig, Bruce. Besides, I have work to do.”

“How many bars did you two go to last night, anyway?” Clint leaned forward, hooking his fingers in the handle of the mug that Bruce had set next to Tony’s elbow. Tony grabbed it immediately and glared at him, and Clint let it go. “And what the hell were you drinking for the asshole to actually get _buzzed_?”

“People kept buying him drinks, I don’t know.” Tony waved a hand and pushed boxes of notations around on his tablet screen. “He’s got one of those faces where people just buy him drinks. And it made him stop fucking _brooding_.”

“And so you gave yourself Earth’s mightiest hangover trying to keep up with him?”

“I was trying to be a good friend!”

“Not the word I would have used to refer to you, but your aid was appreciated, Stark.”

The three men looked up to see Loki and Sif exiting one of the elevators. There was something… well, _different_ , even from when he’d seen them last night on the roof. The Asgardians were always graceful, moving catlike and powerful wherever they went, but there was some different quality to how the two of them moved now. If it was possible, they both looked taller, or maybe they just held themselves differently, with more confidence; their hair was glossier, their skin brighter. Even Loki, usually pale enough for Tony to crack jokes about the God of Mischief working at Hot Topic circa the mid-nineties, had a ruddy flush.

They made a beeline for the refrigerator. Not an unusual behavior in itself, but Tony watched them just the same. Yesterday had been one new crux of insanity after another, and he wasn’t at all certain that something new wouldn’t present itself.

Which of course it did. Though they pulled out half the wrapped packets of raw meat he’d set out in the fridge (so they could be thawed enough for the Asgardians to eat, because Tony was a considerate person), Sif only unwrapped two of them. Of course, after the usual ritual of adding nearly every spice on the rack she proceeded to all but inhale the contents of both as Loki sat beside her stroking her leg, so that part was… well, mostly normal. But Tony still straightened, looking at the six packets of meat still on the countertop beside Sif’s hand.

“Are you going to eat all those?” he asked. “Because you really shouldn’t take them out of the fridge if you aren’t, we’ve been over this.”

“I need them,” Sif replied. She licked her fingers clean, watching him. “For later.”

“You’ve some on your chin,” Loki said - _purred_ \- and before Sif could reach up to clean her face he had leaned over and _licked_ the little dribble of juice off her skin. Clint, who had been in the middle of stealing Tony’s mug of coffee, fumbled it and spilled the contents all over the counter. The billionaire swore and lifted up his tablet, peering at the completely nonplussed Asgardians through the clear screen. All Bruce said was _hm_ , and took a sip of his tea as though it was the most normal thing in the world.

“Look,” he said, “I’m real happy for the two of you. Trading killing each other for fucking each other loudly enough to be heard through soundproofed floors, definitely an improvement. But, uh…”

“It is part of our… how did he put it last night, Loki?”

“Weird alien viking mating dance.” Loki tore off a piece of the steak, eating it with obvious relish.

“Yes.” Sif shrugged, tearing a strip for herself. “Do you not like the scent of yourself upon Lady Pepper’s skin, Tony Stark?”

“I… don’t usually _sniff_ Pepper…” Which wasn’t exactly true, Tony loved how Pepper smelled. When she was off on business trips he sometimes spritzed the pillows with the Yves Saint Laurent perfume she wore, which was something he would _never_ admit in front of anyone else, least of all Loki. The guy was bound with _spells_ or whatever that supposedly assured his good behavior, but Tony didn’t trust them. Besides, good behavior didn’t necessarily mean he couldn’t be an asshole. “So what, is it just a scent marker thing?”

“Is that how you refer to it?” Loki said idly. He rested his chin on Sif’s shoulder, watching as Tony threw a washcloth at Clint and pointed at the spilled coffee. “I suppose the term is apt.”

“It sends a rather clear message to anyone who might be interested,” Sif added. She had reached up, her fingers stroking one of Loki’s cheekbones. “That we are no longer _available_. If another lady of Asgard happened to be present and also close to her heat, she would smell me upon Loki’s skin and know not to approach him as a potential mate. Likewise, had there _ever_ been any question as to _my_ choice—“ and she eyed Loki here for a moment, “—Thor would know that I had accepted Loki instead.”

“But… _licking?_ ”

Loki shrugged. “It is quite an efficient and pleasant way to do it. And it seems to perturb you, which only adds to the appeal.”

“Be nice,” Sif murmured, but she smirked as she put another piece of meat in her mouth.

“Nice isn’t in his vocabulary.” Tony sighed and poured another cup of coffee as Sif gave the rest of her unwrapped raw steak to Loki and collected the other packages of meat, heading out again. “Just don’t do anything _too weird_ without me around!” he yelled after them.

Clint waited until the Asgardians had disappeared before he snorted. “You’d better be prepared to spend a _lot_ more money on food for them this week,” he said. “Things are ‘bout to get really weird around here.”

“Good,” Tony said, tapping his screen to call up the analysis of Loki’s blood samples again and adding to his notes. “Because you know how much I _hate_ being bored.”

*

Steve climbed the stairs between the two common room areas of the penthouse. The floor he’d just left was more of an entertainment room – it had the ridiculously huge television, the game systems, the printer that everyone used when they had to. But Steve had just made a run through Barnes & Noble, and he’d tucked one of his purchases under his arm and left the low roar of Jane, Natasha, and Clint playing Mario Kart behind to find some peace and quiet, and—

“Woah!” Steve yelled, hurriedly spinning around on the stairs. There was a rustling behind him, but when he glanced back over his shoulder, Sif and Loki hadn’t exactly moved apart like they normally would have. There was still barely a breath of air between the two of them, and Loki’s hand still stroked up under the big sweater Sif wore, but Steve felt less like he was intruding now.

“I apologize, Captain,” Sif told him. One of her hands was stroking the back of Loki’s neck, and Steve realized she was soothing him. The trickster’s eyes were narrowed, the fingers of his free hand twitching on top of the blanket. That spot between Steve’s shoulder blades started to prickle, and it was made all the more disturbing by the fact that Sif remained so calm. 

“You may find us in such positions again. It is part of the courtship process we go through, and short of sequestering ourselves away in our rooms for the full duration – something that because of other compulsions is not possible – there is nothing we can do.”

“…ah.” Steve cast about for what exactly he ought to say in this situation, but only came up with “So, I guess you two have uh, resolved your differences?”

“Yes we have.” Loki’s voice was tight and controlled, almost a low growl, and Sif made a soft noise and stroked his hair, murmuring something in his ear in their language until he relaxed slightly. “Your concern is appreciated.”

“You two were throwing knives at each other a couple days ago.” Steve shrugged. “I guess I just want to make sure everything’s okay.”

“Everything is _fine._ ”

“Loki…” Sif was looking at her lover again, and Steve very quickly began backing up the stairs.

“I’ll find somewhere else to read and give you some privacy,” he said. “Glad things are, um, better.”

“Thank you, Captain.” Sif smiled at him as he left and fled back up to the entertainment room. Natasha looked up as he sat heavily on one of the squishy couches and ran his hands over his hair.

“Just ran into Sif and Loki?” she said, looking back at the screen and perfectly timing her shell throw to knock Clint off the Rainbow Road.

“How’d you know?”

“You look terrified.”

“What’s going on with them?” Steve set his book down, crossing his arms. “Two days ago they were ready to kill each other, now they’re down there… feeling each other up.”

Tony, sitting crosslegged on the kitchen island with his tablet resting on his thighs and looking rumpled, clicked his tongue. “Freakier by the minute,” he muttered, and resumed work. Steve gave him a quizzical look.

“You’re quiet,” he said. “And off your game. Where’s the witty comeback? Pepper being in Washington can’t be the only reason you haven’t changed since I saw you last.”

“These clothes are comfortable, Rogers.”

“The smell coming off them makes _us_ uncomfortable,” Natasha grumbled.

“He’s distracted—oh for fuck’s _sake_ , Clint!” Jane leaned over Natasha and poked the archer in the shoulder with her controller. “What do you have against me?”

“I want to win and you were in the way!”

“Neither one of you are going to beat me,” Natasha pointed out. “I’m about to lap you.”

“God _damn_ it, ‘tasha—“

At that moment Thor came scuttling up the stairs from downstairs, pursued by an angry Loki and a very embarrassed Sif. Everyone was on their feet or diving for cover as Thor spun and put up his hands, talking very quickly in their language. Loki’s eyes were blown wide as he hissed a question in response.

“I swear it, Loki,” Thor said firmly. “I meant nothing by it.”

Sif came up behind Loki and ran her hand down his arm, fingers brushing his knuckles. The response was immediate—Loki turned his head to look down at her, attention instantly shifting. He said something and she replied, glancing at Jane and Natasha, peering over the back of the couch.

It wasn’t much, but it was enough for Steve to put the pieces together. So when Darcy came bouncing out of the elevators, and Sif’s head whipped around to glare at her immediately, Steve got up and went over to her, putting a hand on her shoulder to stop her from moving any closer.

“I see your claim,” Thor was saying quietly. “You know I will not challenge it. Have I not said as much?”

“Loki,” Sif said. “He has made his intentions clear. Can we not _go?_ ”

Her voice was low, not quite a growl, but the way her hand tightened on Loki’s wrist and how her eyes kept tracking over to Darcy and the other women in the room made Steve nervous. Luckily, Thor seemed to know what to do.

“We will not interrupt you,” he said. “Now that most of us are gathered here, we know.”

“Yes,” Sif said, seeming to come back to herself a bit when Loki reached over, fingers slipping under the hem of her sweater again. “Yes, that is good. Come, Loki.”

They left back down the stairs, and Steve let go of Darcy’s shoulder. She rubbed it, but looked up at him.

“I don’t know what just happened, but I’m pretty sure I should be thanking you for saving my life,” she said.

“Thor? Got an explanation for us?”

“Sif’s in heat,” Tony said. He was back on the kitchen island.

“They will be like this for the duration of the heat, I fear,” Thor said. He went over to Jane and put his huge hands on her shoulders, leaning over to meet her lips when she tilted her head back. They lingered over the kiss a moment before he straightened, meeting the eyes of every person in the room. “It is best to tread lightly with them and make no threatening moves. I would also advise against making statements that can be interpreted as… flirtatious.”

“Why are you looking at _me?_ ” Tony whined.

Natasha snorted. “Why would he look at anyone else?”

Tony opened his mouth to protest, but shrugged and closed it again. “Fair point.”

“Was this why you wanted to go with me on my trip in a few days?” Jane asked. “I was a little confused, you’re usually pretty adamant about staying with the team.”

“Can I not spend time with my love?” Thor rumbled, grinning down at her. Jane reached up with her hands and clasped his, and they touched noses again. “Though I do think it would be best to find a way to leave while they are in the grip of this. It will make things easier on them, and I will be able to devote my attention completely to you, Jane Foster. As you deserve.”

“What’s it going to be like?” Steve asked curiously. “I mean… what can we expect?”

Thor hesitated, but Jane squeezed his fingers. “I think you should tell them,” she murmured. “I know you want it to be from Sif and Loki, but I think they’re just a little bit indisposed.”

After one more moment of thought, Thor nodded. “I see your point. They must focus on other matters—“

“Like _licking each other?_ ”

“—and I do not wish any of you to be… alarmed. Because some of the behavior associated with the mating drive is not anything like what you have seen from us so far.”

Clint and Natasha paused the game and set their controllers down, getting comfortable, their thighs brushing together. Bruce, at a small table by one of the windows, set his tea down. Thor looked at all of them, at Steve and Tony last, and nodded.

“I know some of you have already heard most of this, so I apologize for repeating it once more. But you must know what will happen now…”

*

Tony Stark was many things, but _a good listener_ had never been counted among them. When he looked up from the homemade superconductor he’d been tinkering on and saw Pepper had fallen asleep, her iPad dangling dangerously close to the edge of the couch, he reached for a blanket and found there weren’t any.

“Huh,” he said, turning around in a circle where he stood. They kept blankets in a basket to one side, usually several so that everyone could have one. But the basket was empty, and there were none draped over the backs of the couches, so Tony set off on a mission. Steve and Natasha had gone out on patrol, Clint was in bed early, and Thor had left that afternoon with Jane, bound for Culver by way of Norway. That left one person who could weather the storm of Tony.

“What’s up, Doc?” he asked, sweeping into the lab. 

“Taking another look at your work.” Bruce glanced up. “I thought you were going to be gone a while with Pepper.”

“The blankets are gone.”

Bruce, Tony thought, wore _confused puppy_ really adorably on his face. “If that’s code for something, Tony, I don’t—“

“No, the blankets are totally gone. _And_ the throw pillows. We have been robbed of our textiles.”

“Maybe they’re in the laundry. It’s been nearly a week of aliens canoodling all over this place, someone was bound to get fed up…”

“The aliens are both fastidious groomers and extraordinarily private with their actual naked time. They just make out and lick each other.”

“ _You_ ” have no problem cuddling the pillows they’ve smeared with whatever pheromones are running around their bodies. Others might.” Bruce shrugged and set his glasses down, sensing there would be no work done while Tony was there. “But if you ask me, Sif probably just took them.”

“What?”

“Didn’t you listen to Thor?”

“For a while.”

“She’s basically been preparing a den for this whole week. Women seem to be the ones to take charge of this kind of thing, so she’s, you know, making sure her mate is going to be comfortable.”

“I can’t believe I’m letting them do this in _my tower._ ” Tony crossed his arms on the steel lab bench and put his head down. “And I don’t think Rockstar Rudolph _cares_ about how comfortable the fucking _den_ is.”

“No, but it’s probably instinct. She’s been stockpiling food too—“

“ _That’s_ why their fridge has been constantly empty!”

“—and so it stands to reason that the other part of things is her building a nest so she can be a suitable mate. Tony, did you even pay attention when Thor was talking, or were you busy dabbling in reproductive xenobiochemistry?”

“I paid attention.”

“Really?”

“JARVIS has a recording.”

“That doesn’t count.”

“Ugh, whatever.” Tony ran his hands over his face. “I’m going to have to lock up my bedsheets because there’s _no way._ Unless…”

*

Sif tilted her head curiously at the box outside the door. It was as tall as she was, and when she reached out to open it and see what was inside, Tony popped out from behind it wearing the biggest Cheshire grin she’d ever seen.

“Surprise!” he said brightly. “Congrats on the sex, Happy Heatmas, whatever.”

“I…” Sif cast about for the appropriate response. Certainly on Asgard a couple would often receive gifts when they had made it their intent to conceive during a mating cycle, but they were usually small gifts at the start and bigger ones when it was confirmed they would be having a child. This seemed like a very large gift indeed, and Sif had certainly mentioned none of it. She had not wanted anyone here to feel obligated, and they were already being generous enough to allow it in their home.

“It’s blankets!” Tony reached in and pulled out a blanket in an appealing russet color, and when she took it the fabric slid through her hands, it was so soft. “So you don’t have to steal ours.”

“This is _entirely_ full of blankets?”

“There may be some pillows too. I didn’t know if you two were side sleepers or back sleepers or—“

He cut off when Sif embraced him. “You are very generous, Tony Stark,” she said quietly. “Whatever your affectations are, you have a kind heart. Thank you.”

“Don’t let it get out,” the billionare said, seemingly embarrassed. “I’ve got that bad boy image to maintain.”

“Your secret is safe with me.” Sif let him help her move the box into the room though she could have easily handled it herself. After he’d gone, she began pulling blankets out of the box and taking them into the bedroom, arranging them carefully on the bed and around on some of the other furniture. She meant for her and Loki to be unclothed as much as possible (indeed the thought of being pressed skin to skin with him now made her toes curl inside her boots) and, given Loki’s penchant for the softest sheets and most luxurious furs, she meant to see him comfortable.

Perhaps her thoughts had summoned him, for as she was laying out a green blanket she felt arms wrap around her waist and pull her back. Unlike other men Loki had not put on more muscle during the courtship period, but she had always liked his more lithe body. He was sinew and lean muscle, though, and her fingertips slid along his bare arms. He had just bathed but she could smell herself under the soap, and turned in his arms so she could push her nose into his hair.

“I smell Stark on you,” he whispered. His scent shifted, carried the acrid tang of jealousy. Every instinct flared telling her to soothe it away and Sif took one of his hands.

“He has brought us a _gjöf_ ,” she hummed against his palm, tonguing the pulse point at his wrist for a moment. Loki’s eyes were heavy-lidded, and when she breathed deeply of his skin once more the jealousy-scent was fading quickly, replaced once more by things that were much more pleasant. “Come see.”

She led him to the box and pulled out another blanket, holding it out. “Feel them. Like the softest wool, are they not?”

His eyes sparkled at the touch, and when he had run his hands over it he swept the blanket over her shoulders and used it to pull her close. His nose went to the curve of her shoulder again, then up her throat to her hair, cool quick tongue lapping at the sensitive skin behind her ear. Sif whimpered as heat sparked through her and buried her hands in his hair, kneading like a cat.

“You will make it comfortable here,” Loki purred against her skin, and Sif hummed her pleasure, fingers working through his hair. 

_Soon._

*

“Jesus. How many trips is that today?”

“This is our third order of foodstuffs today, sir. However, based on my observations, it will be the last. Sif has filled the refrigerators you have given her for use in the rooms she shares with Loki, and she has indicated that when that occurs, there is little left for her to do in preparation for the week ahead.”

“How do _you_ know?”

“I have analyzed and collated data from every instance where the mating drive has been discussed by the Asgardians. There is a searchable internal wiki on your server, sir.”

Tony furrowed his brow, pointing up at the ceiling. “Is my AI sassing me?”

“Maybe if you had _paid attention_ ,” Pepper replied, turning a page in her magazine, “You wouldn’t be surprised by everything going on around you.”

“It’s so much more fun to just let it happen.” Tony tapped a few of the icons on the displays and they vanished, letting him see Pepper more clearly. She was sitting with her feet up on the couch, silhouetted against the New York skyline, and she was the most beautiful woman he’d ever seen. “I’ve been a little busy lately.”

“Still stalking them?”

“I’m not _stalking_ them, Pepper, I’m gathering information.”

“A venture which has not been very successful so far, sir.”

“Thanks a _lot_ , JARVIS.” Tony sighed, walking over and sitting on the floor by Pepper’s side. She put out a hand and ran it through his hair, and Tony wondered if there was something to all the weirdly affectionate touching and petting that the aliens had been doing. It seemed to chill Loki out when he started prickling, and it was soothing Tony too. “I don’t even know if they’ll need it, or want it, or… what.”

“Well, if they’re childless this time, you’ve got ten years to get an alien fertility boosting drug right.” Pepper set her magazine aside and cupped his cheeks, tilting his head back. “I’m proud of you. You’ve been very kind to both of them, and god knows that kindness isn’t something Loki always deserves.”

She pressed her lips to his forehead, and Tony closed his eyes, letting her hair brush his face and her hands warm his skin. “I still haven’t been able to catch one of them in the bathroom, though.”

“ _Stalking._ Creepy, disgusting stalking.”

“Science! I have to understand the physiology of these crazy aliens we have living in our home. But I can’t ever seem to catch them in there, and Loki somehow figured out how to turn off the security devices I put in—“

“You _bugged_ their bathroom, Tony? What the _hell_ \--“

“Science, Pepper! But he figured out how to turn it off, and not with magic either, he got into the computer system because he’s a slimy little shit—“

Pepper took her hands off his face and threw them up. “I can’t believe I’m sleeping with a peeping tom.”

“I don’t want video! I just want to know if they excrete waste at _all_! I’ve never even caught _Thor_ at it!”

“This is a new low for you, Tony, and I’ve been around you for years. I want you to go take out all those bugs. _Now_.”

“But Pepper—“

“ _Now,_ Tony!”

“Fine, fine, I’m going. JARVIS, mind telling the NatGeo Special Presentation subjects to get out of their room for a minute?”

“No need, sir. They are on the roof.”

“Oh, good.” Tony collected the tools he needed and headed for the elevator. “Hopefully they’re up there for a while because I’ve got a lot of work to do.”

*

Sif bent her head, palms pressed flat to the graveled rooftop of Stark Tower. Above her, Yggdrasil’s branches stretched unseen, but their energy coursed through her, pulsing like a living thing.

_Mother,_ she thought, and felt the stars spark through her muscles, the warmth of suns sliding down her spine. _I am ready._ We _are ready._

Beside her, the gravel crunched as Loki knelt carefully, then bowed before the Great Mother as well. His scent was nervous again, but it was faint and diluted by the potent musk of a man on the cusp of being brought into the mating cycle. It made Sif’s mouth water, tongue sliding along her teeth as every breath filled her lungs with that which was undeniably _Loki._

Sif kept her forehead pressed the gravel a moment more, then sat back on her heels, staring up into the sky. For a moment she thought she could see Yggdrasil pulse brightly, _feel_ the fire that had been fed over the past week suddenly blaze higher. But only for a moment, and then it was gone – but only temporarily, she thought. Less an abandonment and more like a wave before it reaches the shore.

Her eyes closed slowly and she savored the warmth of Yggdrasil’s touch upon her, the piney, male scent of her mate, the anticipation that curled in her belly.

“It is almost time.”

Sif let her chin drop, keeping her eyes closed. “Tomorrow, or perhaps the day after,” she replied softly. Her fingers reached out and found his wrist, thumb stroking his wrist until he flipped his hand and slotted their fingers together briefly. It was fleeting and he let her go quickly, but the feeling of his skin lingered.

She heard Loki suck in a breath. The nervous scent spiked and Sif turned, bringing his hand up to her face. 

“We are together in this,” she murmured. “Whatever happens, Loki. I will not leave you alone.”

She felt his fingers stroke her skin and opened her eyes to find him watching her. In the darkness she could see pinpoints of light, the glorious shining ribbons of Yggdrasil tracking gold across green irises and inky-black pupils, and by the way his expression shifted ever so slightly, Sif knew he was seeing the same thing reflected against her own hazel eyes.

“You are not alone,” she repeated, and pressed their lips together.


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this is nothing but sex and pop culture references and dumb ideas ft. tony stark
> 
> art by me

The first time, it knocks the stars from Loki's eyes and the breath from his teeth.

He's never had her like this before, abandoned and brilliant-bright and needing nothing from him but what she can pluck from between his ribs and unravel from his skin with her tongue. This time it's different, _so_ different, in ways he didn't think it could be and ways he wouldn't change for the worlds around them. Sif is like fire and ash in his mouth, sticking to his tongue and rough in his throat; she breathes herself down his lungs, she takes him in, and he lets her consume him.

(The warrior is in the throes of Heat but she is more than that, she _is_ heat, heat and flame and the stars that burn in his eyes made flesh above him to melt the God of Mischief to his knees.)

Before him she let the spells of the healers cool the prickling beneath her skin, and after him she would ask the same magick of his own hands, drawing them down over her belly when the stars settled beneath her skin. He has tasted the tang of the heat upon her tongue, but never like this.

It _burns_. It's white-hot and glittering and it's all he can do keep up with her, to stay with her as she ends his world in fire.

Sif's hands over him are quick and light, the scrape of her nails over his skin like daggers and her kisses darkened with haste. She is an animal in the shade of contempt, twisting her fingers against his jaw to bare his neck to her teeth, pinning his hands to the nest of blankets she prepared for him out of instinct, licking cries from his tongue with her own.

 

 

Loki gives under her heady hands, cradling her jaw as Sif shoves him to the sheets, drinking the inferno of her down his throat, tasting want and need in her mouth. Her body above his is brilliant as she moves, grinding herself against him even as she nips at the space of his collarbones and the curve of his neck, wanting all of him at once, her eyes fever-bright and her movements slippery with desire.

This is not the first time he has had her in ways such as this, heady and undone and her blood like lightning through her veins. She is the Goddess of War, she carries death beneath her feet and when the blood of her enemies soaks her skin it is like songs to the Mother-Tree echoing behind her eyes. The rush of battle and the instinct it brings is nothing new to the Trickster and nothing that has not claimed him before in turn, but this is something different, something _more_.

The warrior's fingers trace his collar and Loki arches his back, offering himself up, and she takes, she takes and takes until he has no more to give, until she bleeds sweat and breath from his body like blood. One of her hands slides down his chest, slick over his damp skin and the dusting of hair beneath her palm and she mounts him like a stallion, riding him rough and he throws his head back into the pillows, bottom lip bit between his teeth. His finger curl in the thick blankets, the fabric soft yet suffocating on his skin, hot hot everything is so fucking _hot_ and the God of Mischief feels feverish himself for all the warmth between them. Sif's mouth on his is like a brand and the inside of her is like stars, burning and brilliant and consuming everything he has to give.

The warrior's hands card through his wild hair, strewn over the pillows and around his face like a halo, and she takes it in her fingers, pulling his head back and sparking lightning over his skin, pressing her teeth to his jugular as she rocks into him. The God of Mischief pants, whimpers caught in his throat and forced from his tongue in the way Sif moves above him, the heat of her melting him like metal and gold (and she will make him anew as she has always done, and he would gladly break for her a thousand times more because every time she puts him back together he is more whole than he could ever be on his own).

Sif throws her head back, her body curved atop him and one of her hands dragging thin white lines down between her breasts as she moves. When Loki tries to lift his head to watch ( _stars_ , how he loves to hold her gaze as she comes apart) she growls fiercely in her throat, a hiss slick from her teeth as her other hand claws around the dip of his collarbones, holds his neck bared to the slide of her nails over his skin. The pressure is slick and hot, he can't breath as much as he'd like and stars fade into the edges of his vision as she slides her free hand between her legs. His fingers wrap around her wrist, keeping her hand at his neck where it hurts, it hurts so good and he feels so fucking _used_. The stars seep into his eyes and surround the warrior, she lets him breathe but long and slow like the world around him until there is only her above him, around him, overtaking him-

She breaks, her mouth on his like fire and ice, the beginning and the end, the waters of the Mother-Tree pouring from her teeth down his throat and brilliant in their veins, their union the highest act they can offer in Yggdrasill's honor.

As he comes the warrior lifts her fingers from Loki's salt-skin, and when he breathes in, wide-eyed and burning, he takes the universe with him.

  
+

  
“Tony.”

A disgruntled _wat_ emanates from the walk-in freezer where Tony is digging for snacks.

“Why is there a life-size poster of Loki tacked to the wall?” Rhodey asks, twirling his Wii-mote in his hands as he stares at the offending image.

“It took you that long to notice?” the billionaire quips, opening a box of pizza rolls onto a tray and sticking it in the oven. “You're not on point today.”

“I've swept your ass in Mario Kart for the past half hour, I am most certainly on point,” the officer retorts, fingering the pause button, tempted to let Tony's character spiral off the course before he has time to reach his controller.

“Rainbow Road is pure luck and you know it,” Stark replies.

“And what are all the blue squares for?”

“Ice packs.”

“What, did you throw Loki in a room with the Hulk again and now you're gonna play pin-the-ice-pack-on-the-asshole?”  
  
“Well I hadn't thought of sticking one there but at this point, you never know with the aliens.”

“What? You mean there's more of them running around in here? How many of them are you gonna adopt?”

“Running isn't quite the word that I'd use, but it's the same idea really. And I'm not adopting them; Thor is the only one even close to golden retriever, and Foster already has him eating out of her tiny hands.”

“Tony, I am going to un-pause this game and beat you for the zillionth time if you don't get to the point,” Rhodey deadpans, and Tony knows that look and he knows that his friend will absolutely do it and he really doesn't want to lose yet another round.

“Fine, fine, but you have to promise me you're not gonna freak out. I mean we all kinda did freak out a little bit because _aliens_ but still-”

“Stark,” the officer interrupts, and the billionaire winces because his his finger is _right there on the pause button_. “I've seen the same weird crap you have and, like you, I have dealt with weird alien crap that's a lot worse than beefy space-vikings. I'm pretty sure I can handle whatever experiment you've got going on with Frosty over here.”

“Alright, but I'm warning you, it's pretty freaky. Like, _super_ freaky. They're super _freaks_ ,” Tony says, wiggling his fingers. The timer on the oven dings.

But first, pizza rolls.”

  
+

  
“Loki.”

Sif's voice slips him from sleep, her fingers carding gently through his bedraggled hair, wild around his face like a lion's mane. He can still feel the sting of her fingers around his neck and her name comes rusty and dark from his throat, and what he wouldn't give to do it all over again. The God of Mischief stretches cat-like and curved beneath the blankets, grateful for the chilled air that surrounds them from the windows open to the wintry air.

“Are you alright?” Sif asks, her face hovering over his, her own hair untamed and curled around her face. She's naked in the chilly air but where she touches him her skin still burns; he can feel the fire glimmering in her bones, satisfied but not sated, waiting.

I fear I have exhausted you already,” Sif laughs, stroking the sharp line of his cheek. “Have I too many tricks for even the God of Mischief?” she asks, and there is a feline wildness to her smile and the glint of her teeth.

“It will take much more than that to wound me on this battlefield,” Loki yawns, tossing back the covers. The warrior leans over him and tilts his jaw up with her fingers, pressing her lips to his, the touch gentle where it had not been so before. When she pulls away his eyes roam her body, catching the soft outline of bruises on her hips and the watercolor left on her collar by his teeth. Before he can speak she silences him, a hand over his chest.

“Don't even think of apologizing,” Sif commands, and Loki can hear War dripping from her tongue, her domain thick in her veins. “If I did not want your marks I would not have let you leave them,” she says, and he knows not to argue, sitting up. A hiss slips from his teeth, and Sif laughs.

“You should be more worried for yourself,” the warrior scoffs, eying the angry lines of red that cross the God of Mischief's shoulders and slide slick down his chest and the painter's palette of color she's left beneath his jaw. Were she not in the throes of the Heat she might trace the scratches with her tongue to soothe them, but now they are kindling for the fire that burns in her belly and moves her to straddle him, leaning into his hold and tilting his head back, her fingers tangling in his hair as she devours his mouth, devours him.

“Again? You really are hungry,” Loki purrs, dragging his nails down her back as she moves up to her knees, pushing him back into the sheets with a sly smile.

“ _Starving_.”

  
+

  
“Holy _shit_.”

Clint swipes a hand over his face and through his sweat-dampened hair, letting himself sink even further into the squishy mass of blankets and bed beneath him. One arm curls haphazardly around Natasha's back as she sits next to him, rolling a scarf between her hands and tossing it across the room.

“You say that a lot, Clint.”

“I know but really, I mean it this time, holy _shit_.”

“I've tied you to the bed frame plenty of times,” Natasha counters, raising a brow.

“Maybe it's all the alien pheromones floating around the tower,” the archer whines, rubbing his wrists and stretching like a cat over the sheets. Silence hangs between them after the redhead scoffs, then Barton rolls over, propping himself up on his side.

Do you ever just think about that?” he asks.

“About what? The pheromones?”

“There are alien space vikings _breeding_ in this tower. As we speak.”

“So? We've dealt with worse.”

“Like right now. At this very moment.”

"I know. If you listen real close in the gym area of my floor, you can hear them."

"It's so weird though," Clint muses, folding his hands behind his head on the pillow. "Five years ago he nearly took out New York with an alien army and now he's upstairs being used as a fuck-me toy for his viking warrior girlfriend. Or whatever they are to each other. Do Asgardians even _have_ that stuff?"

"Eight years ago you and I were at each other's throats because you were sent to kill me and I wasn't inclined to agree," Natasha replies, draping herself over Barton's chest and scratching her nails over the dusting of hair. "And look where we are now."

(He had once asked her if he was the only man to survive a night with the Black Widow, and she had told him when she fucked him, she wasn't the Black Widow.)

"Point."

"Stranger things have happened, and stranger things will happen," she continues, drawing shapes on his skin with a finger. "As long as he's not subjugating planets, I don't really care what he does."

"I'm never gonna let him forget that bullshit with the scepter."

"No one expects you to," the redhead agrees, resting her chin on her crossed arms. "I don't think Stark is ever gonna take his helmet off the wall above the television, either."

"I shouldn't feel comfortable being under the same roof as him," Clint adds.

"Maybe you're not."

"Sif's awesome though. She's _cool_."

"You only like her because she the only person in this tower impressed by your arrows," Natasha teases, reaching around Clint to grab one of his shirts, pulling it over her head.

"Hey, that just means she has good taste," the archer replies, throwing on a pair of shorts as Natasha slips her underwear back on.

"Then maybe Sif and Loki aren't such a strange thing after all," the redhead muses, heading for the elevator as Barton follows.

Now come on. If I find that Stark has stuck his greedy little paws into my stash of pizza rolls I'm gonna be pissed."

  
+

  
“Lokiiii.”

“ _Nei_ , Sif.”

The warrior purses her lips in a pout, rolling onto her back, her limbs sprawled out over the sheets. She stretches, feline and languid, spreading her fingers and curling her toes. She drags one of the pillows above her head onto her face, inhaling the newly-fresh scent (it isn't the first time Loki has used his magick to clean the room and it won't be the last) before squishing it against her chest.

“I'm bored. And everything is hot and itchy. I need scratching. Come back to bed.”

“If you want me to still be alive by the time this is over, you'll suffer for a few minutes and let me eat,” Loki deadpans through a mouthful of raw steak. He appreciates (grudgingly) Stark's efforts at stocking an entire _system_ of fridges for the week, but perhaps he would have been more help by just giving the Trickster a constant IV-drip and calling it a week. At least he wouldn't have to _move_.

(But then he thinks of Sif grinding her hips against his, her hand on his neck and his head tilted over the side of the bed, or the warrior on her hands and knees and beckoning him over her shoulder, and he doesn't mind so much anymore.)

“Can I have one, at least?” the warrior pleads, her eyes glued to the bowl of cubed meat on the table, guarded by Loki's arm.

“You inhaled an entire kitchen of food before this all started and are running on enough hormones to power an army entirely by yourself,” he counters. “You can wait.”

The glint of the God of Mischief's teeth in the setting sun is diamond in Sif's eyes, blood heavy on his tongue and she wants, stars above she _wants_ ; wants to lick the rust-color from his lips and then bare her neck to his canines so he can run them red again. The heat flares in her belly once more, never really leaving even after she exhausts him, and she lets her feet touch the soft floor, naked as she came.

“Loki,” she whispers, pressing kisses to the curve of his shoulder, licking her way towards the place where his neck and jaw meet, nuzzling against his cheek. He is hers, only hers, this she tells him in more than words and the feel of his hands on her hips, her nails dragging up his chest and slipping around his neck.

The God of Mischief tilts his head back, helpless to deny her. Sif tastes blood on his tongue, and he lets her take him whole.

  
+

  
“I can't believe you're participating in this,” Rhodey sighs.

“Are you kidding? If it involves deadly force aimed at Loki's dick I am _so_ in.”

“I'm with Clint.”

“Can it, Natasha.”

The world goes dark as a length of cloth ( _scarf? silk tie? God I hope this didn't come from Stark's bedroom_ ) winds over Clint's eyes, Tony's hands tying it expertly around his head. The assassin stands up as a blue square is thrust into his hand.

Remember, head and limbs are five points, neck and torso are ten points, hips are twenty points and the crown jewels are fifty,” Tony says, leaning against the couch, as if he's rattling off a grocery list and not the God of Mischief's body parts.

“Wait, I thought head-shots were always worth the most points?” Rhodey questions.

“Uh, hello? Hickies? Dicks? Way more important. I thought you knew how to play this game.”

“Shut up,” Clint growls, “I need to concentrate.”

“On the deadly force or Loki's dick?” Tony retorts, watching the archer's arm hover over the poster as he decides where to smack his particular _faux_ ice pack.

“There's gonna be deadly force aimed at _your_ dick in a minute.”

“What's this about deadly force and-”

Pepper's question is cut short as she enters the huge living room, freshly off of work to see Tony, Natasha and Rhodey sitting on the couch, a blindfolded Clint's hand firmly planted over the poster's crotch.

“My turn,” Natasha breaks the silence.

“Hey Pepper,” Tony calls. “Wanna play a game?”

  
+

  
“Sif, Sif _please_ -”

“Shut your mouth, Loki, just-”

The warrior’s hand clamps over his mouth as she moves, her bottom lip bit between her teeth, her other hand clawed into his chest. Loki’s hands grip her wrist, sliding up and down, his nails leaving lines of white on her skin. His head tilts back against the pillows, desperate for breath and the stars that cloud his vision.

“Sif I _can't_ -”

“ _Já_ you can, Loki,” she hisses, pressing her lips to his collar and licking the salt from his skin, riding him wrecked and rough and she's almost there, almost fucking _there_ -

Her name in his throat is razor-sharp and cut from his teeth when he comes and he can't even remember how many time it's been already, only that his feet slip against the sheets and it's too much it's so good but it _hurts_ and she won't let him move, her hands clawing his own to the bed, her head thrown back and her body still and finally, _finally_ she comes down. Sif's body is brilliant and burning, every meeting place of his skin and hers like a brand between his ribs and everything is so warm and it's all he can do to just breathe. The warrior holds him, feeling his fingers dig into her bones as she cradles him close and the stars melt from his vision, Yggdrasill's Branches hanging vibrant in his eyes with all of the magick that shimmers through his veins at Sif's touch.

The warrior leans up on her elbows, her face pinched pink and her eyes fever-bright with stars and the heat that runs through her veins, and she laughs, her hair wild around her face like a lion's mane.

“Are you sure you'll be alright?” she asks, running a hand through Loki's own unruly hair, pressing a kiss to his forehead in comfort, tasting the salt of his skin and willing the warmth in her belly to calm to let him rest. Yggdrasill help him if she were to take him again, and when the slightest flicker of sleep nips at the corners of her eyes she lets it eat her up, swallowing her whole and sinking her sweat-slick skin into the sheets. She won't sleep long, she can feel so in the lingering prickle of her bones, but it will be enough.

“Fire cannot kill a dragon,” Loki breathes, his breath and his heart beginning to slow, exhaustion gnawing at his bones. Sif's brow furrows at the obscure, quintessentially Midgardian reference, and she ignores it.

“War and sex are not the same battlefield.”

“In you they most certainly are,” the Trickster retorts, pulling Sif down next to him and cradling her head against his shoulder. “Please tell me you're tired. Even if it's a lie, I need to hear it.”

“The God of Lies begging to be lied to? It's even been an unusually long winter for this coast of Miðgarðr, maybe it is _Ragnarǫk_ ,” Sif teases, her jest punctuated by a yawn and her naked body scooting closer to his, radiating heat even in the winter cold. When her eyes close Loki passes his hand over them, the sharp scent of magick filling the room as the tang of sex melts from the sheets and their skin, and he slips the warrior into a deep, long sleep.

Leather and cloth glimmer over the God of Mischief's shoulders as he staggers out of their floor, a single destination in mind.

  
+

  
“Dawn of the third day.”

“It's too early for video game references, Tony. Actually it's too early for _anything_ , go back to sleep.”  
  
“I can't Pepper, there are aliens getting it on in my tower and it's a very surreal experience for me.”

Pepper takes a deep breath, remembers that his love of science and research is one of the things she actually _does_ love the billionaire for (even if he does have a betting pool going on the Loki poster), and punches him square in the face with a pillow.

“Seriously? Are you trying to damage the goods?” Tony whines, sitting up on the edge of the bed.

The only response is a muffled _hrhrmgphh_ from the lump of blankets Pepper has again buried herself under, so the brunet throws on a t-shirt and shorts and heads downstairs. _Maybe Bruce is up_ , he thinks. _At least_ he _can appreciate reproductive xenobiology_.

To Tony's dismay, no one is in the kitchen at seven in the morning on a Saturday, so the billionaire pops a tea cup in the Keurig and pokes his head inside the human-designated walk-in fridge.

“Jarvis, put fruit on the human grocery list,” he calls to the AI, the only sentient life in the tower he can count on to be awake with him. The AI's reply comes through the speakers as Tony opens the other fridge labeled 'alien-space-god-vikings' in his own messy scrawl.

 _Thor and Jane are in Norway until further notice and Loki and Sif are on their week-long sexodus_ , he thinks. _They won't miss an orange or_ -

“Wait, _what_?” he yells, and Loki's disgruntled, half-asleep voice growls at him from the floor.

“ _Stark_.”

What the fresh hell are you doing on the floor of my refrigerator? Don't you have a whole goddamn floor of this _tower_ to lounge around in? And where's Sif? Did she gnaw off your man-parts and leave you to die?”

“Get. _Out_.”  


+  


Upstairs, Sif wakes. Alone.

“ _Loki_!”

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sorry i'm graduating from college in two months and things are busy i'll try not to take 3 months to update a fic again
> 
> LOKI'S IN TROUBLE


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> At long last, the next chapter! Enjoy!

“No, but seriously, what,” Tony repeated, “Are you _doing?_ ”

“I _was_ sleeping.” Loki put a hand over his eyes. “This is not your freezer. Go away.”

“I gave you blankets. Like, four million blankets.”

“One hundred and fifty.”

“Whatever.” Tony leaned on the counter, watching the cold air from the freezer condense and drift out. Inside, he saw Loki put a hand over his face and drag it down. “The point is that you're out here and not in your den of sin with your domme, so... what are you doing?” Loki said something that was muffled by his palm, and Tony made a show of leaning forward, cupping a hand behind his ear. “I'm sorry, what was that?”

“I _said_ ,” and Loki's voice was as frosty as the air around him, “I needed a _break_.”

“Can't keep up with Sif, huh? Having some _performance issues?_ ”

Loki lifted his head and glared. “There is nothing wrong with my _performance_ , Tony Stark. But I needed rest, and... cold.” His voice became quieter, thoughtful, almost dreamy. “She is heat, the heat of stars and fire, and her every touch burns, and I crave it and need to escape from it and _need_ it...”

“...oooooooo _kay_ then,” Tony muttered after Loki had trailed off. “So you had to get out of the frying pan before you became breakfast, literally?”

“All I am is hers to take. It is our way when the Heat comes.” No more dreaminess; Loki was all business here. “I would give everything in me to her if she asked for it.”

Tony didn't know what to say to that. It sounded dangerously sincere, and a sincere Loki was not a variable he knew how to calculate. He was about to lighten things up with a quip about pieces of meat when the elevator doors opened and Sif strode out, eyes wild, hair a messy corona around her face, and totally naked.

“ _Loki_ ,” she hissed at Tony. Terrified (and he would defend the legitimacy of this to everyone for the rest of his life), he pointed into the freezer. Sif nodded tightly and stood before the open freezer, heedless of the cold. Loki had propped himself up on his elbows, and though there was unease in his face, there was also that strange expression he and Sif had used over the days leading up to their... denning? Sequestration? Sexcapade Fun Week?

“Good morning, Sif,” Loki said carefully. “I meant to bring back food, since you won't leave me alone about it every time I break off to eat, but the floor was so... comfortable in here...”

Sif grabbed his boot and pulled him out onto the kitchen floor, slamming the freezer door shut. She dropped, straddling his hips and gripping his jaw tightly in her hand. “You _left me_ ,” she snapped. “You _placed a spell upon me._ And then you left.”

There was definite panic in Loki's eyes now. “Sif, I, I could not even once more, I needed time to recover, I—“

“Be silent, or I will silence you.” Tony did not think all of the roughness in Sif's voice was because of her anger. But it didn't matter. “How could you do this thing, Loki? We are _bonded mates_ , we are in the middle of the Heat, and you do this.”

“I...” Loki could not finish his sentence; wide-eyed under Sif, he opened and closed his mouth a few times, and then drew a deep, shuddering breath, “I could not be worthy of you if I could not be a strong enough mate—“

“Would I have chosen you if you were not?”

Loki closed his mouth, expression sullen. “Perhaps. Out of pity.”

“You were never deserving of my pity.” Sif tilted her head, considering him, and something in her softened. “I have not been so mindful of your needs. Not,” and her hand tightened on his jaw, “That this excuses you using your magic on me. Never again, do you understand me?” Loki nodded quickly, and after a long moment Sif drew her hand away, grabbing his shoulders and pulling him up. Loki's fingers danced over her thighs, restless.

“You will be better, won't you, Loki? You are sorry?”

“Yes.”

“Good.” Sif stood and Loki stood with her, shaking just slightly. Her hands slid over his back, his side. “I was afraid when I awoke and you were gone. You will come back and make it up to me.” To Tony, in a matter-of-fact tone of voice, “Thank you for looking after him for me, Tony Stark.”

“Uh. Anytime, Sif.”

Tony watched them go, Sif leading Loki by the hand, and gave himself a full-body shake when the elevator doors had closed.

“Weird as _fuck_ ,” he muttered, and went to go make notes.

*

Loki expected to be ordered to strip and resume trying to put out a fire that remained days away from being quenched as soon as the door shut behind them, and sure enough, Sif sat back against the headboard of their bed and made an imperious motion with her hand. “Remove your clothes.”

Alone with her and under the full influence of the Heat, he could not disobey. But when he started toward her, instead of spreading her legs she pulled his head down to her chest and stroked his hair.

“You know it is not just about the fucking,” she admonished. “We learned the same things at the knees of our tutor. The Heat is a bond forged between two mates, one that deepens a little more every time. We have seen this through before, and the effects now... I know you feel them.”

“It is because we did not stop the full eff—“

Sif yanked his hair gently and he hissed, but it was a good pain. She did it again and he squirmed against her, swearing he could hear the smirk in her voice when she spoke.

“That is not all. I meant what I said to you, before we began courting. I meant what I said just moments ago. I would not have chosen you if you were not worthy of me and worthy of being a father to the children we will make, for we are mates and I think... I think we always have been. You were not the only man I went through the Heat with, but you were the first, and I cannot think of anyone else I would want.” She was quiet, stroking his hair, his shoulders, his spine. “It is the responsibility of mates to care for each other. I have not been good in this.”

“You put aside enough food,” Loki mumbled against one of her breasts, but shifted and kissed it, the heat of her skin burning pleasantly on his lips even as her laugh filled his ears.

“Infuriating man. What will I do with you?” Loki raised his head and Sif held his jaw in her hands, kissing him long and firmly. The heat built between them, and when she twisted her hips and wrapped her long, strong legs around his waist, need had filled him, need for her body and the feel of her hands upon him and the approval of his mate.

*

Thor woke to voices, and stretched out across the bed... which, he realized, was far too empty. Reaching an arm out, he felt only mostly cool sheets and an empty pillow, and cracked his eyes open. Jane was sitting at the writing desk in the bedroom of their hotel suite, her laptop open and the room's phone cradled between shoulder and ear. He studied the way the light caught the edges of her body, her bare shoulder and breast and thigh, limned it with bright white and yellow, picked out the lights in her hair. Jane was as glorious as the heavens she studied, and he was eternally glad he could look upon her thus.

“I understand your trepidation, Professor Hjorth,” she was saying patiently, obviously trying to be quiet enough not to wake Thor up, “But believe me, I double-checked the calculations and made sure there was no malfunction with my detection equipment. The readings are sound... Yes, I know it doesn't make sense, but this is cutting-edge, and we know we're basically in uncharted territory...”

She glanced over at him and a guilty look crossed her face. _Sorry,_ she mouthed, before looking back at her screen. “Well, you'll just have to work with it, unless you want me to reserve the telescope again... for a window of time a year from now... No? Good, I'm glad you see that now. I look forward to hearing from you... yes, I'm in Norway right now, for the next week. I look forward to seeing your analysis. Goodbye, Professor.”

She hung up the phone, and Thor said, “I thought we agreed there would be no work on this trip.”

“I know, I know. I'm sorry.” Jane closed the laptop too and got back into bed, and after a moment's adjusting and moving pillows around, settled against his chest. “No more for the rest of the trip, I promise. The laptop's going away... later on. After we get out of bed.”

“So perhaps tomorrow. Or the next day.”

Jane grinned against him. “Maybe.”

She wrapped her arms around him and threw a leg over his, and Thor closed his eyes. The touch of her bare skin was enough to rekindle the fast-fading heat in his belly, and the way she arched and pressed against him as he trailed a hand lightly down her spine only stoked it further. The effects of being in proximity to Sif as she went into Heat weren't strong in him, but they were there, and Jane had breathlessly confessed to enjoying reaping their benefits last night. He would never have challenged Loki for her, nor would he have disputed Sif's decision... but it was still for the best that he and Jane had gone on this trip halfway around the world, putting distance between him and them. Loki felt less threatened that way, and though self-control around Asgardian women in Heat was one of the first things he had learned as he had entered adolescence (it wouldn't do for a Prince of Asgard to _misbehave_ ) he didn't want to jeopardize the tenuous peace he'd found with his estranged brother.

“You're thinking too much,” Jane mumbled, pressing her lips to his jaw. “That's usually my job. I'm really good at it, don't take my job, Thor.”

“My apologies.” Thor shifted his grip and Jane slid on top of him, her hands splayed out on his chest and pushing herself up to sitting. “I am only glad we have this time together, whatever the motivation for it was.”

“I'm glad too.” She leaned down and kissed him, and for all the desire it was also sweet and loving, and Thor buried his hands in her hair and held her there until they were both breathless. Jane sat back up and reached between them, and the sunlight in her eyes sank into pupils blown wide with need, and Thor let himself fall with it.

*

Steve scrubbed at his face in the elevator going up to the kitchen. It was three in the morning, and most of the tower was asleep, but nightmares had chewed at his mind to the point where he had no choice but to succumb to insomnia and head up to make himself some tea, something to try and settle his mind, maybe read a book or catch up on some of the shows the team watched. 

He made it as far as pulling one of his mugs out of the cabinet (labeled “CAP!” in red and blue markers on a white piece of tape) and turning on the electric kettle before he realized that he wasn't alone in the kitchen. A testament, he thought, to the level of his sleep deprivation.

“How's it going, Doctor?” he asked, leaning back against the counter with the electric kettle beginning to crackle and hum behind him.

Banner passed a hand over his head, mussed his hair even more than it already was. “Well, we're both here, so we're probably in about the same boat.”

“Probably. Want some tea?”

“Oh – yeah, yeah that'd be great, thanks.”

Steve brought one of the mugs out of the “GREEN GIANT” cabinets. “What are you reading?”

“Oh, uh... Darwin, actually. _On the Origin of the Species._ ” Bruce placed a bookmark and set the paperback down on the end table. “Always good to go back to the start when I don't know what to make of what's going on around me.”

“You mean the Asgardians?”

“I mean the Asgardians. Thanks.” Bruce took the mug of chamomile tea Steve handed him and cupped it in his hands.

“It's been quiet lately, at least.” Steve turned on one of the lights in the room, kept it dimmed low. He took the leather seat across from Bruce's couch and leaned on his elbows, watching steam curl out of the mug. “Tony told me what happened a couple days ago.”

“Me, too. I'm glad I wasn't around for it.”

“Think it would have set you off?”

“No, it just would have been pretty damn weird.”

Steve snorted into his tea. “That's for sure. I guess it'll all be over soon, though, right?”

“Only a couple more days, supposedly. Then life will get back to normal. Unless Sif gets pregnant from all this.”

“From all the sounds I've heard, I don't know how that won't happen.”

“An alien newborn in a tower full of people who shouldn't even be working together, much less living together.” Bruce took a sip of his tea. “That's the worst idea I've ever heard.”

*

Something was different this time.

Sif arched and twisted beneath him, seeking that one spot, that one angle, but though he had to work to pin her down her lips still found their way to his shoulder, his throat, and the tender kisses she placed there were more stimulating than the feel of her body around him. Every inch of his skin was on fire but it was so much better, so much less maddening than all the times before. Sif's hands slipped over his back, their legs twined together, and Loki kissed her hard and long and tasted heat and the stars on her tongue and he couldn't get enough, could never get enough.

It was just like before, but so different. It felt like the cogs of a great mechanism had finally clicked into place in his life, and somehow he had not ever been prepared for it.

“Loki,” she breathed against his skin, and he buried his face in her throat, inhaled the scent of sweat and sex and _Sif_ , licked salt off her neck, until she grabbed him by the hair and pulled his lips back to hers. “Loki, _please_ ,” and the sound of her begging, of the needy, breathy little whines that escaped between her clenched teeth, nearly undid him.

When she found that _spot_ and cried out, wrapping her arms around his shoulders and clinging on to him, nails dragging at his scalp and body convulsing under him, he finally let go and followed her. Their eyes were locked the whole time, though at the end her mouth opened in a smile and her eyes fluttered almost closed, an expression of sheer ecstasy and delight, and as he came down from his own orgasm Loki was transfixed. He had never felt what Sif felt until this week, and he had found it addicting.

As she twitched and clenched and tried to regain her breathing, Sif ran her fingers through his hair over and over again, coaxing him down to rest on top of her. Their skin stuck together but Loki didn't mind, not now. All he wanted was to feel the two of them lay together, to stroke her hair and caress her skin and revel in the fact that she had chosen him over anyone else.

“You think too much,” Sif mumbled. She butted her head against his. “I can all but hear it.”

“I swear to you they are not dark thoughts this time.”

“And do I take your word for it?” 

Loki would have felt stung if he hadn't caught her looking up at him through her lashes, grinning. He pressed his lips to hers. “I would think, Lady Sif, that you would be able to see through any lie I tell you by now.”

“Perhaps I have developed an offshoot of my brother's ability – able to spot any lie, anywhere in the universe.” They both laughed, and Sif cupped his cheek briefly before nestling down in the blankets under him, and sighing contently when he resettled himself on top of her, protective and craving the feel of her skin.

“I could not lie to you any more, you know,” he said, and Sif curled a hand around one of his arms. 

“I know,” she said, barely audible. “I know, Loki.”

And at last, after the sun had long since sunk below the horizon, they slept.

*

When she woke, it was to a stiff neck and numb limbs.

“Ugh,” Sif muttered, and pushed Loki off her, stretching life back into her arms. He didn't wake up, thankfully, and she took a moment to touch his face, the planes of his chest.

_I chose my mate wisely,_ she thought, a smug smile on her face even as she traced the faint lines of her nails down his chest and back. _And apparently, I cut him to ribbons. Not that he seems to mind much._

That made her realize that the heat filling her body had dissipated. By now she would have been rousing Loki, but she had no desire to, no overwhelming need. She wanted to be close to him, certainly... but the thought of having time apart no longer filled her with apprehension.

“It's over,” she whispered, her hand still resting lightly on her lover's cheek. Something about that made her feel a little empty, but only in the most distant sense. The Heat might have retreated, but she and Loki were bound together now and far tighter than ever before.

That thought filled her with warmth of a different kind as she rose to bathe, and Sif smiled. Things were changing again, but they would not face that change alone. Never alone, ever again.


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i have no good excuses honestly

“Tony?”

Bruce Banner winces as Stark’s yelp bounces off the glass and steel of the lab, a loud clatter of tools abruptly following it.

“How do you people _do_ that?” Tony asks as Bruce sets his cup of tea down and reaches down to help him gather up the mess of parts and tools and knick-knacks that he knocked from the table in surprise. “Are you taking lessons from Romanova? Is that why you’re always up in the middle of the night like this and there are all these strange noises echoing through the air vents? Because that’s horror movie levels of weird and slightly unsettling.”

“No, but that’s not a bad idea,” the scientist admits, brushing his hands off. “And the weird noises definitely aren’t coming from me. You might want to ask the aliens you’ve so lovingly welcomed to reproduce in your tower about those.”

“Believe me, I have,” Tony sighs, sticking a screwdriver in what Bruce thinks is a piece of armor and fiddling with it. “But they’re so secretive! I’ve only got like one tablet of notes about it, and one tablet is never enough notes.”

“Really?” Banner asks, taking a sip of his tea and eyeing the bag of blueberries that Stark seems to have forgotten about. “Because I’ve had some great conversations with Sif about Asgardian physiology and even their spiritual practices. It’s some fascinating stuff.”

“Wait, what?”

“And there was that one time that Pepper and Natasha took Sif on a girls’ day out while you and Loki went shopping and drinking and generally making fools of yourselves, and she basically poured her heart out to them.”

“How come I have to get Loki the frosty, expensive-as-shit equivalent of smashed before I get all the juicy deets, but all _you_ have to do is smile and wave and look vaguely uncomfortable and suddenly you're everybody's best friend?" Tony whines, continuing to tinker with the lump of metal while Banner commandeers the blueberries.

"You might not have so much trouble if you weren't so..." and the scientist makes a vague waving gesture in Tony's general direction with his hand.

"Smart? Sexy? The envy of all those around me?"

"...you."

"Wow, _rude_."

 

+

 

Sif wakes to the early sounds of the city as it comes alive, muffled through the thick glass of her and Loki's floor of the tower. She aches in all the right places and warmth spreads between her legs when she rubs them together, the past few days a blur of sweat and sex and Loki's cries on her tongue. She yawns, stretching cat-like and languid on the sheets, and when she rolls onto her stomach her hair curves wild over her shoulders and over her eyes. The space next to her is empty and cool, but unlike the last time she woke without the Trickster beside her, she feels no burning need to find him and literally drag him back to their bed, and she laughs.

 _Stars only know what he would think if I stormed down the tower naked again_ , she thinks. _Poor Banner, having to bear witness to such a display_. 

_Not Stark though_ , she decides, snickering into the pillows. _He absolutely deserves everything he asks for._

Rising with the sun is nothing new to the warrior, and as she stands she takes a clearheaded look at the room for the first time in almost a week, and the sight is enough to make her feel a twinge of embarrassment.

The scent of salt and sex hits Sif like an axe-swing, and she decides her first order of business is going to be locking herself in the suite's enormous shower and not coming out until she's at least attempted to rob the tower of all its hot water. There are sheets and blankets scattered everywhere, strewn across the floors in Loki's frantic efforts to rip them from her body, and she attempts to pick them up and dump them in the appropriate laundry baskets Tony had thrown in with them.

 _Some of them are ripped to shreds_ , she notices as she goes, though from Loki's hands or her own she can't quite remember. 

_And those scratch marks were definitely not there before this started_ , the shieldmaiden thinks, staring at an impressive cluster of messy, jagged lines on one of the walls, though she remembers quite clearly what caused them, and that they're definitely hers.

Sif stands naked in the middle of the suite of rooms, a pile of blankets and sheets in her hands with only the sunrise to greet her, her hair a corona around her face and her skin a painter's palette of colors and kisses.

 _We managed to make an utterly royal mess_ , and she giggles into the mass of fabric. 

_Success_.

 

+

 

"Боже мой."

"Is that a black eye?"

"Okay, I know I said that thing about Sif ripping your head off and leaving you to die as a joke, but are you _sure_ -"

" _Stark_."

He lets out an _eep_ as Loki steps off the elevator, and this time Tony knows better than to make any comments, although Clint isn't so forgiving. He can't blame him though, really; with a bruised cheekbone, a long scratch (scar? _damn_ ) across one of his eyes and the lingering evidence of enough hickeys to paint a goddamn landscape with, the scientist doesn't really have the heart to tell the assassin to stop.

"What the fuck did she do to you?" Clint asks, waving a hand in Loki's general direction, his attention turned from a riveting level of _Starfox_ to the even more riveting opportunity to bust the shit out of Loki. "I almost feel bad for you, like, _almost_ ," the archer says as he squishes his thumb and index finger together. "Like, maybe a gnat's ass worth of sympathy, but that's it."

"A _what_?"

"You know what, never mind," Stark hurriedly interrupts, waving his hands, knowing (and being very proud of the fact that he knows) that this can absolutely not end well in any way shape or form. "How about you just go collapse into the freezer and we'll leave you alone and then when you're done doing...whatever it is you do in there, you can go back upstairs to the Love Shack and we'll stay down here and no more of my tower will get broken. Sound cool?"

"Can Sif teach me how to do that?" Natasha pipes up from where her head is resting on Clint's lap, her hand sneaking into his box of Cheez-Its while he's distracted.

"You are not learning how to give me a black eye during sex," Clint growls, slapping her hand away from the box she's managed to almost empty over the course of an hour. "I don't care what other kinky shit you're into but that is not going to happen."

"Yes it is," both the brunet and the redhead respond in sync, and the archer leans his head back into the couch, closing his eyes. the silence admission of his defeat.

"Okay Frosty, if you're done staring at the wall you can go curl up in the fetal position in the freezer, none of us are going to—what are you _looking_ at?"

" _Stark_."

Tony turns behind him to see what the hell could possibly be disturbing their space-viking so much until he realizes that _oh God, Pepper warned us to take that down and we never did, shit shit shit my fucking tower is doomed will I ever_ learn—

"What. Is. _That_?"

Tony swears he can feel the eyes of the life-sized poster of the Trickster burning holes through his chest, to converge with the equally as painful holes the very angry and very real thing is boring into his back and the combined fire of all these evil eyes is going to incinerate him on the spot and why does this keep happening ??? to him ??? Why !!!

"I can explain, really, I can," Tony declares, holding his hands up in surrender. "Just, please don't destroy my tower in yet another fit of rage."

" _Oh_ this is gonna be good," Clint laughs, holding the box of Cheez-Its like it's popcorn and shoving a handful in his mouth.

"Shut it, Pit, like you weren't the first one to raise your hand so you could use a rather disturbing amount of force to smack an ice pack squarely on his dick." Turning back to the furious Trickster, he continues. "It was a harmless betting pool on which parts of you Sif would ruin the most—"

"And I regret _nothing_."

"Ice? Where?" Loki asks as if on a tape-delay, all anger and teeth suddenly gone, and if he hadn't just spent nearly a week being used as a fuck-me doll by an insanely powerful Asgardian shieldmaiden, Stark might have laughed.

"Well here on earth we have these things called ice packs that you put in the freezer, and when they're nice and cold you put them on parts of your body that are sore so—"

"I need them," Loki states, completely and wholly serious.

"Wait, _huh_?"

"I need them, all of them," he repeats, turning towards the walk-in freezer, and it's only now that all of them notice what Tony's barely been able to keep his mouth shut about the entire time.

"Are you _limping_?" Clint asks, eyes wide in disbelief and possibly surprise but definitely amusement.

It's a testament to how utterly exhausted Loki is that he doesn't crumble the entire tower where it stands (for which Stark is most grateful), and only rolls his eyes in a gesture of disgust that transcends time and space and species, opening the door with a flick of his wrist and shutting it behind him. Silence stretches across the lounge area for a few moments before the crinkle of plastic shatters the illusion of normalcy,

"So...are they done? Are we gonna take the poster down before he remembers it's there or what?" Romanova asks, finishing off the box of Cheez-Its.

+

Sif tosses the last of the ruined sheets into one of the laundry baskets Stark had so graciously supplied along with the blankets (one labeled "SALVAGEABLE" and the other "NOT"), putting her hands on her hips and surveying the room. There isn't much she can do about the scratches in the wall just yet, but she'll gladly repair them if their host doesn't insist on having one of his many little mechanical helpers do it instead.

She's put all the furniture back where it belongs, tossed everything worth saving (and to her relief, there isn't much that isn't) into the basket to be cleaned, replaced the sheets with the one set Tony told her to absolutely not touch if she wanted to sleep on a clean surface any time soon, and opened the windows to let in light and fresh air. Feeling satisfied with her work, the warrior throws on a roomy button-up flannel and a pair of sleep shorts, her hair still a wild mess even after a thorough wash. She makes her way up the stairs to the penthouse on the roof, flinging the glass doors wide open.

The sounds of New York surround her like the buzz of bees, flickering around her head and thrumming in time with the beat of her heart and the beat of the tiny little one that (could?) be inside her soon.

"Nice to see you out and about. Have fun?"

Sif whirls around, startled at Pepper's words, seeing the CEO smile from her lounge chair. Her hair is up and she's still in her pyjamas, a mug of tea in the cupholder and her tablet on her lap.

"I'm sorry, I didn't know you were already up here," the warrior apologizes.

"What's there to be sorry about? You staring at the city isn't bothering me at all, although sometimes I have to wonder what you find so fascinating about it."

"What isn't?" Sif laughs, seating herself on the stone surface, its warmth from the early afternoon sun seeping into her skin and soothing her aches. "It never rests, it's almost alive. It's like a concrete heart pumping people endlessly through its streets, all with their own lives and troubles and hopes and dreams."

"That might be the nicest bite anyone has ever taken out of the Big Apple," Pepper grins, and Sif lowers her eyes, laughing. "So, did you wear him out? I think I heard through the grapevine that he's currently asleep in the freezer."

"Not too much, I hope. I do still need him, despite his..." and Sif pauses, the right word on the tip of her tongue.

"Idiosyncrasies? Complexities? Peculiarities?"

"Issues, really," the shieldmaiden deadpans, and both women share a laugh.

"He's certainly not the only one. Try knowing Tony for as long as I have," the redhead drawls, taking a sip of her tea. "Actually, no, try knowing anyone in this tower, period."

"None of us should be on the same _planet_ together, let alone in the same living space."

"But here we are," Pepper concludes, turning with Sif to look out over the skyline.

"Here we are."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Боже мой ( _bozhe moj_ ) - russian for 'oh my god'
> 
> pit - the cupid bow-wielding asshole from kid icarus/smash bros (will tony ever stop giving clint dumb nicknames ? nah)
> 
> SEE Y'ALL IN ANOTHER YEAR (im kidding, i really am)


End file.
